Fireteam Tokyo
by 7thManiac
Summary: It had been several years since Shinji Ikari, former pilot of Unit-01 and Third Child, had been brought back from the dead to fight for humanity again. In all those years spent fighting through the ruins of humanity he had always missed HER. Now he was back in Japan, the ruins of what was once Tokyo-3, where SHE died and with a Ghost at his side he was determined to bring HER back.
1. The Land of the Living

**WriterGirl:** Edited on Sep. 24/16

* * *

 **Chapter 1: The Land of the Living**

 **The Hole, Tokyo-3 Ruins, Japan**

"Well…they weren't so tough," Mari called out in a disappointed tone as she floated to the room's window as an explosion roared in the distance. "I mean I think I could have gotten through them and I'm a Ghost!"

Ghosts, drone like machines purpose built to find individuals who can serve as Guardians, the elite protectors of humanity. Like most Ghosts, Mari's core was made of a dark grey sphere around the same size as a golf ball with a flat 'face' that contained her eye. Mari's eye was a square diamond with squared corners, with a small circle in the middle with the outside section is split vertically into two halves, unlike most Ghosts though her eye glowed green instead of a light blue. Mari's shell, like all Ghosts, consisted of four triangular pieces arranged around the eye in a cross formation with a square diamond shaped cut-out in the middle for her eye while four identical pieces in the same arrangement made up the rear of her shell. Mari's shell itself is pink in colour with white accents while 'THE BEAST!' was stenciled in white on her right side beside her eye.

What truly made her unique as a Ghost though is that she is, currently, the only known female Ghost in history, an aspect of herself she took great pride in.

She heard a sigh come from behind her followed by a soft male voice.

"Mari-chan… _can_ Ghosts fight?"

Mari turned around to face not just a Guardian but _her_ Guardian, her Hunter. He wasn't particularly heavily built, quite slim actually which lead to him being often mistaken by strangers to be a female Hunter. He wasn't particularly tall either, standing around the average height of a sixteen year old male, making him shorter than most Guardians.

Standing in the doorway he was clad in the style of armor worn by all Hunters, a lightly armored full body suit. His body suit was mainly dull black in colour and made of a synthetic leather like material. The armour was light but strong with his lower body protected by almost knee high grey boots and dark purple plate armour knee pads. His torso was protected by a dark purple armored chest plate, protecting some of his vital organs while leaving his abdomen protected by the synth leather, a compromise for flexibility and protection. On the middle of the chest plate was written the three letters 'FWC' in white text while three diagonal stripes, one red, one yellow and one white ran down his abdomen. As a personal touch '01' was printed in green over his right breast while the side facing silhouette of a fierce demon with one horn, it's jaws open in a roar, was stenciled in white over his left breast. His helmet was simple. The upper half was dark purple with a triangular plate bolted on the front with three camera lenses, one on each corner, providing the enhanced optical information necessary in the Hunter's common role as a scout while a green bandana covered the lower half.

His right arm was very lightly protected, keeping it flexible for the skilled handling of firearms. The only armour protecting his right arm other than synth leather was a simple purple shoulder pauldron with green accents, a purple armored elbow pad and a green metal bracelet protecting his wrist and lightly armored purple gloves that mainly protected his knuckles and little else, favoring dexterity more than anything. His left arm though is what distinguished his gauntlets as something truly special. Mounted on his left shoulder was the skull of an ahamkara, a dragon like creature hunted for their body's seemingly magical properties while the still moving spine of the same beast served as a forearm guard, mounted on a vembrace, while a lightly armored glove the same as his other one protected the hand. They were the gauntlet's called Young Ahamkara's Spine, named after the beast it had been made from.

Rounding out her Hunter's outfit is the quintessential piece of Hunter gear, the cloak, a stylish hood and cape worn by every Hunter to show off their achievements, honour past Guardians and events, break up their silhouette in the wild or just add their own personal flair to their appearance. Currently he was wearing a blue camouflage ankle length cloak with a white trim, the same design worn by the legendary Ayane Takanome whose skills with a sniper rifle protected hundreds of refugees during mankind's collapse before the birth of the Guardians hundreds of years ago.

In his left hand he held the large Hunter's Knife, a large single edged knife with a curved blade and a gut hook.

In Mari's opinion it was more of a short sword than an actual knife.

In his right hand he held the oddly named Havoc Pigeon, a pistol with a grey frame, boxy purple slide with green accents that resembled the 21st century Glock series of pistols. The gun was special though because, other than the punching power and great performance, it had a suppressor attached to the end of the barrel. Suppressors were rare on the guns used by Guardians, the high powered cartridges used in modern weaponry simply being too powerful. As a result the suppressors that were in use tended to be expensive and time consuming to make which made them rare and only attached to the best of firearms.

On his back was Monte Carlo, a clean and sleek white auto rifle with a simple dot sight and an absurdly long bayonet that, to Mari, was more of a sword than anything else.

…Her Guardian liked sharp and pointy things Mari realized.

"No, of course not," Mari answered as her Guardian sheathed his knife behind his waist and returned Havok Pigeon to its place on his right thigh, the armor sensing his intentions and activating an electro-magnet that held the weapon in place.

"Ok, good," her guardian nodded, " I was afraid that in the…how long has it been? Seven years?"

"Seven years, two months, three days and 37 seven seconds."

"…Right, seven years. I was afraid that in those seven years of you being with me through all that fighting you just chose not to help," he teased.

If she had the eyelids to blink in surprise she just knew she would have, instead settling for blinking her eye's light instead. Her Guardian was many things, quiet, polite, a good cook and a crack shot but teasing? That was one thing he wasn't. She should know, she had perfect memory after all and in seven years he had _never_ teased her before, usually that was her job.

Her Guardian walked through the room and grabbed a chair and a tall bar stool and a table and placed the chair at one of the blown out windows while placing the small table beside him, placing Monte Carlo on the table, ready to be quickly used. He then placed the bar stool down behind the chair and sat on it.

Mari, knowing what to do after years of practice, floated beside him and looked out the window.

"So," Mari started as she focused outside, "I'm guessing you want to test out your new toy?"

"…Yes," he muttered and she could tell he was a little embarrassed with his eagerness, she couldn't blame him though, he did get a new rifle from the gunsmith and from what she could tell with her scans it was quite the custom piece.

Quickly searching through his inventory she selected the sniper rifle Stillpiercer for transmat and in a flash of bluish white light the sniper rifle teleported from their ship in orbit to her Guardian's lap. Stillpiercer was a powerful sniper rifle, the base gun had been a HAKKE made sniper, the same weapon foundry behind Havoc Pigeon, but heavily modified and upgraded by the The Tower's gunsmith. The gun resembled the 21st century M110 in appearance and the receiver was olive drab in colour. The rifle's barrel had a grey thermal shroud wrapped around it, to help disguise the rifle in the wild and also to absorb some of the heat generated by the rifle's powerful round. At the end of the barrel was another rare suppressor, although the sheer power of Stillpiercer meant the gun was nowhere near the whisper quiet of Havoc Pigeon and still quite audible at medium ranges. Sitting atop the rifle's optic rail, covered in dark green camouflage netting, was a custom sniper scope with a HAKKE red dot sight fitted on top for emergencies.

Stillpiercer was designed to keep the user undetected at long range while keeping him stealthy enough to loose off a few shots at medium range before being found and it showed.

Mari still remembered what the gunsmith said when he handed the gun to her Hunter.

' _By the time they know you're there, it's already too late.'_

She couldn't help but agree with him.

Her Guardian positioned himself on the bar stool while resting Stillpiercer's barrel on the top of the back of the chair, the tall stool allowing him to look down and out through the window as the chair stabilized the rifle's barrel. He was careful not to extend the barrel out of the window, actually keeping the muzzle around a foot away from the window to better conceal them in their now set up sniper's nest.

Mari focused her attention outside and onto the floor of The Hole. They were in one of the few buildings left standing, holed up on the sixth floor, the highest remaining floor of the building as the rest had been blown off in the Battle of Tokyo-3, or so she guessed. Mari searched outside, keeping an eye out for movement as her Guardian beside her did the same thing. Her job was simple, act as his spotter and look for targets. While his sniper rifle had more powerful zoom optics the scope had a very limited field of view, so to prevent tunnel vision she would also look for any threats. The scope on Stillpiercer did had an impressive electronics suite that actually extended the range of her Guardian's standard issue motion sensor but it was still only useful for making sure nobody would sneak up on them, it just didn't have the range necessary for spotting targets hundreds of metres or even a kilometre or two away. She, however, did.

So far nothing though.

"So," Mari started, "looks like the plan worked."

Her Guardian looked away from his scope to quickly steal a glimpse at the sight of the earlier explosion, a Fallen outpost…well it _was_ a Fallen outpost. Now it was just a sea of flames surrounded by a cloud of smoke, courtesy of some explosives she had tansmated from their ship.

"Looks that way," came the soft reply, "most of the Fallen in the area are rushing to the scene…I can't believe it worked. I have to thank Cayde-san for the idea."

"It didn't bring in all of them though," Mari said as she noticed a few of the Fallen had been ordered to stay behind, patrolling through the wasteland that was the floor of The Hole. She could see their forms moving between some of the ancient hulks of destroyed vehicles. "Are you going to take them out?" she asked as she sent their location to her Guardian's HUD.

"No, not yet at least. They know _something_ happened but not what happened or who did it. Our goal is to make sure that Ghost finds his Guardian and get them and us out, no need to do anything that would make it harder."

"Understood. So…" Mari drifted off as she remembered the day her and her Guardian met, at this very same place. "Feeling nostalgic?"

"…a little."

"But it's not from the day we met, is it?" She made sure not to sound accusatory when she said that, she understood what he felt, so deep was their connection to each other and their Light.

"No…sorry. This is where I died after all."

"Stop," she said, annoyed. "Don't apologize, you don't have anything to apologize for Puppy-kun."

Seriously, he was too nice for his own good sometimes. He really did remind her of a sad puppy a lot of the time with his big eyes and almost constant small frown, hence the nickname.

"Thanks," and she could see the small smile she knew he had in her digital mind's eye. "A lot has happened here for me. A lot of memories here, good and bad, us meeting? One of the best."

"Flatterer. Speaking of this place, do you have any idea who that Ghost may have been looking for? The moment he said his Guardian to be may be in Japan you smiled. If I could be rendered blind, which I can't, I think I may have been after seeing that bright smile of yours, you were so happy."

And she meant it too, just before they left she had heard rumors of Cayde-6 running around The Tower proclaiming the world was about to end (again) because the, as he liked to call her Guardian, 'Saddest Hunter Alive' smiled.

"Oh I have an idea."

"Are you sure?...You know, I don't think you should get your hopes too high here. If you're wrong…"

"Don't worry Mari-chan, I accepted her death…years ago but…well I can't think of anyone who had died here that would fit the role of a Guardian more. Brave, fiery and strong. She's a perfect fit."

' _I hope you're right,'_ she thought to herself as she continued to monitor for movement, _'you deserve something good to happen to you after the life you've lived, Puppy-kun.'_

* * *

"Wake up!" Asuka heard a male voice call out to her but something about the voice seemed…off, artificial. "Come on Guardian, wake up."

Asuka opened her eyes with a groan as her brain struggled to work through what she last remembered…her last…moments.

"I…I should be dead," she said numbly as she looked at her hands. She looked at both her arms, they were both intact, she clearly remembered her last memory, of having one of them split down the middle. She also saw that her arms were covered in armor and she had on black armoured gloves. "What the hell? I should be wearing a plugsuit."

"Phew," she heard the artificial voice sigh in relief. "Welcome back to the land of the living Guardian."

Asuka looked up and saw…a floating eye drone? It's eye was glowing blue while it's simple white shell moved as it talked.

"Why am I alive?" Asuka asked as she placed her hand on her head and noticed she seemed to be wearing a helmet for some reason. "What the hell happened? Who or _what_ are you?"

The eye drone floated a bit closer and down to her eye level before speaking, it's eye glowing a bit pulsed as the shell moved around its eye as it spoke, giving it a surprisingly organic feel.

"I'm a Ghost," it explained in English, which Asuka easily understood as she was fluent in that language along with German and Japanese. "Well…your Ghost actually, and I brought you back to life."

"Ok...Where are we?"

The… _her_ Ghost, she corrected herself, tilted a bit to the side in a gesture of curiosity that reminded her of Rei. "The ruins of Tokyo-3 of course, where else?"

Asuka looked down and saw the familiar red armour of her beloved Unit-02 although the colour had faded somewhat. She quickly jumped down and ran away from it to get a better view, her Ghost following her. She had remembered being...eaten so she wanted to see what had happened to her Eva and she felt her heart hammer in her chest. She expected a gruesome corpse, torn flesh and organs splayed out but what she got was a body long dead. Stark white bones and broken armour, red paint faded and worn by time. She could see rust clear as day where the armour was cracked or broken, the metal unprotected by the protective coating they sprayed on Evangelion armour.

She looked around and saw that yes she was in the ruins of Tokyo-3, the Geofront to be specific.

"How much time has passed?" she asked in a whisper as she looked around herself. The Geofront seemed to have changed greatly from what she remembered of it from her battle with the nine white Evas. A lush forest had grown at the edges of the massive hole in the ground where the Geofront floor met the walls. She could see huge sections of the walls now had bear rock, the metal plating fallen off long ago. The hulks of the JSSDF vehicles were rusted a redish brown and some of them had vegetation growing out of them. Hell she could see some moss on her Eva's old armour.

"It has been…a _long_ time Guardian. You're going to see a lot of things you may not understand."

"Answer me!"

Ghost flinched, "it has been…more than a millennia. I am sorry."

"Don't apologize when you don't need to," she commented absently as she remembered a sad blue eyed brown haired boy.

Her blood boiled with rage. He had left her to _die!_ When she finally asked for his help he didn't come!

She felt betrayed by the only boy she had ever come to care for.

But just as quickly as it came her rage left her.

Didn't she do the same thing? Didn't she leave him alone too?

And she knew how much that would…probably… _did_ devastate him. Shame flooded her as she remembered _enjoying_ seeing him hurt. They were the same after all and while she would never admit it back then she just felt…too tired? Resigned? To deny it now.

She hurt him and he hurt her.

Who was she to judge him for leaving her? She did the same thing really and she didn't know what Shinji had to go through prior to the JSSDF attack.

She turned to her Ghost as the drone quietly hovered near her. She felt a little embarrassed at feeling awkward at the silence that had descended between her and a _robot_ but, hell, he was the only one to talk to right now and he did seem so… _alive._

"Hey…uh…Ghost was it?"

"That is correct. While some other Guardians do name their Ghosts most just refer to us by that title."

"Uh…what do you want to be called?" she asked awkwardly, she did notice that he kept calling her Guardian and that meant there were others like her. She had questions about them but she didn't label them a priority at the moment.

"Ghost is fine, Guardian."

"Right," she nodded. "So…what happened here? After…I died."

"According to records from that time after your Unit-02 had been...destroyed Evangelion Unit-01 appeared on the scene. What exactly transpired between Unit-01 and Units-05 through 12 is unknown. What is known is that the pilot of Evangelion Unit-01 successfully prevented Third Impact and the Mass Production Evangelions were destroyed in the process. I apologize if you find the information lacking, Guardian, many records of your time were lost or destroyed over the years."

"No it's fine Ghost," she assured her…companion? Sure seemed like it to her since he followed her. "But what's Third Impact?"

"Records available to me are unclear but what is known is that it would have been a catastrophic, possibly extinction level event. There may be more but it's probably classified...or just lost."

Asuka shook her head. Shinji had stopped that? Damn Baka always did have a hero complex, always having to save the day. Still, she felt a little peeved, would it have killed him to come just a _little_ bit sooner? She sighed, _'no point complaining since I'm alive again.'_

"What happened here though? They didn't rebuild?" she asked as she continued to take her environment in.

"No," her Ghost answered with a shake that seemed to be the little drone's version of a head shake. "After the battle the UN had sent in forces to provide security and the city had been cordoned off to deter scavengers. Other than that the city was left untouched, as a memorial and a grave for those that died here."

Asuka then asked a question she wanted…no _needed_ the answer to. "What happened to the pilot of Evangelion Unit-01?"

She needed to know what happened to him. To the one boy who had tried to come close to her no matter how much she pushed him away, insulted him and hurt him. The boy who had wormed his way past her defenses even if she didn't want him to.

How long did he live? With his eating habits she guessed he lived a long life. Did he get married? If the Baka could somehow manage to attract a girl as, admittedly, bitchy as herself it wouldn't surprise her if he could attract another girl. She did hope he found someone nice, someone like Hikari and _not_ herself. Hell, Hikari and Shinji? She approved, Hikari deserved better than the jock she insisted drooling over. Did he have children? With his bastard of a father he had an _amazing_ reference for how to _not_ be a father, he would probably be a good dad she guessed. Did he live a happy life? Now that was the question wasn't it? God knows he deserved it.

Her Ghost though was quiet and just turned his gaze to the middle of the Geofront.

She raised brow behind her helmet's faceplate and followed his gaze.

Her heart froze in her chest at what she saw.

The nine white Evangelions she fought were splayed out in a ring, obviously broken and long dead. She could see some of their bleach white bones through gaps in the armour, what remained of the armour itself now browned with dirt and time.

And in the middle lay the form of Evangelion Unit-01. Some of the armour had been broken and she could see some bone but she could recognize the iconic horned head of Shinji's Eva even from as far away as she stood.

"Please," she turned to her Ghost with a desperate whisper, " _please_ tell me he lived."

"…I'm sorry Guardian. Pilot Ikari is listed as KIA on December 26th 2015."

"Y-you can bring him back though, right? Right?!"

Her Ghost shook in the negative, "I'm sorry Guardian. While I can revive you…a Ghost can only revive their respective Guardian."

Asuka took a deep breath to calm herself, "can we go back to…wherever you came from, get another Ghost and have him revive Shinji?"

"A Ghost chooses their Guardian but considering his record in the Angel War there is a high probability that there is a Ghost searching for Pilot Ikari...but Guardian, there is a possibility that that isn't the case. I don't want you to get your hopes up."

"I know but…I can't give up on him. Not when he tried so hard for me when we were alive"... _'I still owe him for the volcano rescue...I didn't even say thank you.'_

"I understand."

"Ghost…I've been meaning to ask but…am I taller?" she asked. She noticed it earlier, she felt taller, her limbs longer and her breasts, which were protected by a plate of armor, felt bigger as well. If she guessed she was now sixteen. "And what _is_ a Guardian?"

"A Guardian is a protector of Humanity. Warriors who fight against the Darkness. As for the reason of your physical maturity…well I don't really know. I used the Light that was stored in me to revive you as a Guardian. Perhaps your physically young body's small size would make it difficult to fight and aged your body in response? Many aspects of the Light are still poorly understood, apologies."

Asuka nodded in acceptance. So she needed to fight another war huh? Well that was fine with her, she was really good at it and she didn't know how to do much else. She doubted her university education from a thousand years in the past would be useful and she couldn't even cook or clean properly, spoiled by living with Shinji. Besides a part of her looked forward to fighting beside Shinji again one day, and this time she would properly support him.

That said she did find his language oddly poetic, the little drone had been very straight until just now. What was the Darkness referring to? Aliens? Monsters? She would have preferred him to be straight with her.

"Well," she started, hand on her hips in one of her classic poses, "looks like the great Asuka Langley Soryu will be needed again!"

"Now, I came here with another more experienced Guardian, they're hunkered down not too far from here waiting for us so we can use their ship to leave. Let's go, I can explain more to you when we're somewhere safe."

"Right," Asuka nodded before turning back to her Eva and blowing a kiss, a soft smile on her face. "Good bye mama, thank you for protecting me for all that time." She then turned to the fallen form of Unit-01 and spoke in a resolute tone, tears blurring her vision, "I'm not going to blow you a kiss, I'll just give one to you when we meet again, so look forward to it you hear! I'll come back again Shinji and next time…next time I'll be nicer to you. You'll see. Until then…rest well my Baka."

Her Ghost remained respectfully quiet, something she was thankful for.

Asuka shook her head and looked at her Ghost, feeling strong and resolute as a few tears fell down her cheeks. "Lead the way Gho-"

A loud howl interrupted her and her head whipped around searching for the source.

"Guardian," her Ghost urgently called out to her, "stand still."

Her Ghost vanished in a flash of light and she heard his voice clear in her head.

[Don't worry Guardian, I'm with you. I've fabricated your armor out of some of the matter in the area, don't expect anything too special, it's meant as a stop gap until we can get you proper equipment. Here, I'll activate your HUD. Your motion sensor should be to the upper left of your vision.]

True enough Asuka could see a circle there. Inside was another smaller circle with a triangle in the middle, its apex pointing where she faced. The outer 'ring' had been sectioned off into eight sectors. One directly in front, one behind, one to her left, one to her right and one in between all of them.

She also saw a white bar appear at the top of her vision, divided into three equal sections.

"Ghost what's the bar?"

[That's your health bar Guardian] Asuka blinked in surprise, how video game like. [The left and middle sections are for your armour's shields, the third represents how much damage you can take before you die and I have to revive you. Your shields will only recharge if you take no damage for a moment and your shields do not make you invincible, be careful.]

"Right," she nodded as she crouched behind a destroyed tank hull, "stop gap armour, I got it. What was that though?"

"Fallen. The Guardian that brought me here set up a distraction, it worked but it didn't get all of the Fallen in the area to leave it seems."

Asuka saw that something was coming behind her thanks to her tracker and her combat training kicked in as she quickly jumped over the tank to take cover at the other side. Her strength and speed surprised her, she was always fit but…she had never felt so powerful before.

Peaking over the tank hull she saw it.

Covered in dark grey armour was a humanoid form. It had four arms and in two of them it held swords that were covered in a blue glow, the swords themselves resembling the swords pirates once used. It had a tattered red cape and wore a helmet that had two hoses coming out of it, connected to its armoured chest. What caught her attention though was the thing's head. It had an elaborate crest coming out of the back of the helmet while four eyes glared out in her direction, glowing bluish white. It was massive, easily towering three or four heads over a grown man.

Above it her HUD displayed the title 'Fallen Captain.'

* * *

"Movement," he heard his Ghost call out in her uniquely feminine voice.

A waypoint appeared on his HUD, courtesy of Mari, and he trained his scope on the location. It was a Fallen Captain, easy to identify from a Fallen Vandal with its bigger build and size. He also spotted a figure clad in white, grey and silver armour.

The new Guardian, a female he guessed by her slim build and the way her armour hugged her body.

He didn't care right now if that was Asuka or not. He'd worry about it later, right now he needed to cover her.

He quickly flipped off Stillpiercer's safety, and steadied his breathing, his heart rate slowed as a familiar mantra rang in his head, _'centre the target...and pull the switch.'_

Stillpiercer barked for the first time as a soft purple flash lit up in the room, the sniper rifle's suppressor muffling what would have been a _very_ bright muzzle flash.

The tungsten round, wrapped in purple Void Light screamed through the air before impacting the Fallen Captain 787 metres away. The round's Void energy, the force of dark energy and gravity, along with the round's massive amount of kinetic energy made short work of the Captain's shield. His shields flashed bright blue before fizzling out and collapsing, the round then impacted his target's head, penetrating the armoured helmet and the alien cranium exploded in a shower of armour and gore as a whisp of light evaporated from the Captain's neck before the body crumpled to the ground.

"Mari, tell them to get here now!" he ordered as he searched for targets, finding another Fallen he squeezed out another round and Stillpiercer barked again as the rifle claimed its second kill.

"Right. I'll send them a location of that APC we found on our way here. It's going to be in their path, might as well get our Princess a gun," Mari cheerfully replied as she enjoyed the action and gave the new Guardian a nickname, "Let's hope they find something that can still shoot."

 **Next on Fireteam Tokyo - Chapter 2: Reunion**

 **AN**

 **Maniac:** Man I've had this, finished but unedited on my hardrive for...I'd say an entire year. I just got the urge to write it one day but hadn't bothered to work to get it out into the wilds of the internet. That said I did have a lot of fun writing this, I don't have many stories where I can write almost purely gunfights, most of my stories being more melee or even magic focused (at least the stuff I have coming up). I also had a lot of fun writing Asuka here as in most of my stories she's either completely absent or simply hadn't arrived 'on screen' yet.

 **WriterGirl:** It took me offering to edit it to finally get it out, the lazy bum.

 **Maniac:** Pretty much ahaha. Anyway for my long time readers this is how future ANs will be in the future since this is now a, kind of, two man (er one man, one woman) team. Also to my more senior readership don't worry, this hadn't interfered with me working on my other stories outside of writing this AN thanks to WG, I've just been quite busy with life in recent weeks.

Now on to the story I have to say so far I have another chapter planned but nothing past that. Would you guys like more of this story? If so it will follow Asuka and Shinji as they adventure through the plot of Destiny and eventually its DLCs. The updates will be around 5k in length so they should be easier for me to do than the 10k minimum I try to go for with all my other stories, it would also be a pure AxS story. I kind of wanted something easier to write, writing a good harem story isn't easy due to balancing all the characters. This story could serve as a fun breather thing to write since its so different to all my other stuff.

Anyway, until the next time!

 **WriterGirl:** Bye!


	2. Reunion I

_"I am not a dashing rogue. I am not a free spirit. I am a claw in the throat of the dark, and I will draw blood."_

* * *

 **Chapter 2: Reunion I (Damsel to the Rescue!)**

 **The Hole, Tokyo-3 Ruins**

"Phew _damn_ ," Mari whistled as another Fallen Captain fell to her Hunter's new weapon, the semi-automatic rifle quickly proving all the effort that went into acquiring it was worthwhile.

Her Hunter didn't reply, as someone who operated solo most of the time he had grown out of the habit of talking during fighting since there was no one to talk to most of the time. Well, there was Mari but she seemed to be fine talking enough for them both. Instead he shifted his scope again and spotted a Fallen Vandal, they looked similar to the captains but were without the helmet crest, cape and were only the height of an average human adult. Most importantly though they lacked the shields and had _much_ lighter armor.

So knowing that from experience he aimed centre mass before pulling the trigger, not bothering to waste time on a headshot, and the bullet slammed into the alien, blowing a hole straight through his target's chest.

"Pow!" Mari 'jumped' at that, "he went down like a bitch!"

He just sighed at her excessive excitement. Shinji himself would admit he had grown to enjoy fighting to an extent. When you do it as often as he did for as long as he had been a Guardian you had to, it was either that or go insane, but Mari could get a tad carried away. His rifle empty he reached down to the ammunition pouch on his belt, Mari having already filled it with magazines for Stillpiercer, grabbed a fresh magazine before dropping the empty one. After inserting a magazine full with four high-power rounds he worked the charging handle.

Rifle loaded he was ready to rock and roll again.

' _Centre the target…pull the switch…'_

Stillpiercer barked once more.

* * *

"Holy shit!" Asuka swore when she saw a fourth alien, which her HUD labeled 'Fallen Vandal', get slapped down in one shot by the sniper that was covering her like…some kind of murderous guardian angel, coating the ground in a dark violet liquid. Asuka guessed that was blood. She also felt a little frustrated, she had no weapon, not even a knife, and while she didn't exactly mind help considering this was all so new to her she _did_ dislike being a fucking invalid. That was what she felt like right now, a useless extra.

She eyed the form of Unit-01 in her peripheral vision, she knew it was silly but in the presence of both the corpses of Units-01 and 02 she felt the need to show off in front of them, put on a show for her mother and Shinji. She beat the wish down though as she remembered what a similar urge had resulted in during the first battle with the 7th Angel. It was her single most humiliating defeat, sure it lead to her getting closer with Shinji via their synchronization training but she had to admit she was lucky neither of them were hurt during the sortie.

"Sorry Shinji, no show for you today..." she mumbled to herself, "when we meet again though? I'll blow your mind…"

She eyed her motion tracker and saw it was clear, still she knew the range was limited so she stayed alert.

[Guardian] her Ghost's voice popped up in her head [Mari, ah that's what the other Guardian's Ghost likes to be called, sent me coordinates to a derelict APC that may have weapons that still work. I'm popping it up on your HUD.]

"Gotcha," she nodded, "and call me Asuka or something to keep things from getting confusing."

[Understood, Asuka-san]

A small diamond appeared on her HUD, marking something in the distance while an arrow on her tracker's edge pointed in the same direction. She popped her head up over the top of the hull and spotted another pair of Fallen marked 'Fallen Dreg', they were smaller than the Vandals with very little armor but she could see a pistol and a dagger held in their arms, of which they only had two. She jumped in her armour as the Dreg' chest exploded in quick succession, killing them, before the crack of the bullet breaking the sound barrier rang in her ears shortly thereafter. Quickly turning around she faced her HUD marker and ran as another bullet cracked overhead and she knew she didn't have to worry about getting shot in the back.

The sniper was good, she would give him or her that much credit.

Still, just in case, she kept her head low as she sprinted among the vehicles she had wrecked a millennia ago, the ground crunching under her armoured boots, making sure to zig-zag when in the open in case of enemy snipers. Asuka remembered her Ghost telling her something about reviving her but that didn't mean she wanted to know what getting gunned down felt like.

A part of her felt like she was abandoning Shinji but once again she kicked that back _hard_ , she was _going_ to see him again, she couldn't afford to doubt herself now.

"Finally," she murmured as she saw the APC's rusted out hull and she sprinted even faster before getting down and sliding up to it, her armored boots impacting against the hull with a soft 'clang.' She listened and heard…nothing, no footsteps and no cracking of bullets but she was sure the sniper was still covering her.

She walked to the back of the APC, a boxy model she didn't know the name of, and saw that the door had been blown off in the past.

' _Huh, how lucky,'_ she thought to herself as she crawled inside and saw that the machine was partially crushed, and from the looks of it the troops inside had no chance to disembark before she killed them. She guessed that her Eva had stepped on the APC so quickly and with such force that the air inside compressed and the pressure killed everyone inside before blasting out the back and blowing off the door like an explosion. Some of the skulls and bones were crushed, probably from the pressure wave she guessed.

"I fucked them up good huh," she couldn't help but murmur before she realized what she said and who was in her head…boy that was a weird thing to think. "…Sorry if that made you uncomfortable, Ghost."

[It's fine] she continued to search through for something usable [times were different then.]

She nodded…and she picked up a pistol and information entered her mind. There was even statistics on performance and once again she couldn't help but be amused with how video game like it all was. The gun was the standard sidearm for the JSSDF, a Browning Hi-Power 9mm pistol, this one was made in Canada by John Inglis and Company. "Ghost…did you just?"

[Yes, Ghosts exist to find and support Guardians, provide you with information, hack electronics systems, manage your equipment, etc.]

"Right…uh, thanks," she chucked the pistol aside, it was rusted quite badly and she had no faith in its ability to survive being fired. Asuka knew she was covered from head to toe in heavy armour, even her hands looked more like gauntlets than anything else, but she still didn't fancy the idea of a gun blowing up in her hands. So she kept searching, hoping to find something bigger but it was hard with how much crap there was in the old APC. She then grabbed a big rectangular block of a rifle and information went into her brain. It was a German H&K made G11 and-

[I wouldn't waste your time with that Asuka-san] her Ghost spoke up in her head [the caseless ammunition has probably deteriorated by now.]

"Gottverdamnt" she swore and chucked it aside. _'What am I supposed to do, point my fingers at the aliens and shout 'Bang! Bang! Pew! Pew!'?…come on, something useful…'_

[There!] an indicator popped up on her HUD [try that one quick! It's in working order.]

She quickly pushed the skeleton out of the way, knowing time was short, and grabbed a black rifle that was lying there. It was a Japanese Type 89 assault rifle made by Howa in 5.56mm NATO. She recognized it as the JDF standard issue, and had a red dot sight which, to her delight, ran off of ambient light and fiber optics so it still worked even after…however many years had passed.

"Score," she shouldered it and it felt natural enough in her hands, she checked the magazine and after seeing it was full she reinserted it, flicked it off safe and into full-auto before racking the charging handle. "Locked and loaded baby," an ammo counter appeared on the bottom left of her HUD, indicating the weapon's 30 round capacity. She was about to start looking for more magazines when she noticed she had somehow gained 263 rounds of spare ammunition.

[Guardian I've already transmatted extra ammunition, we need to leave _now_!]

"Right," she nodded and ran out of the APC before checking her ammo pouch just in case. "Where to Ghost?" she asked, her voice once again sounding confident.

Finally, she could fight back with some firepower of her own!

* * *

"Well well, Princess made it after all," Mari commented as her Hunter reloaded Stillpiercer once more. "Her Ghost is asking where to go next."

"Can you set up voice communications between us?" he asked her in the calm voice that seemed to always take hold when he was behind the scope of a long range rifle...or anything that went 'bang!' really. "It would be better than just having a nav-marker over her head."

"Negative Puppy-kun, I've already tried, it's hard enough sending text and directions to her Ghost, anything more is impossible unless we get closer...I think the Fallen are up to something her, there's way too much interference in the air. A rag tag band of Fallen with no House shouldn't be able to do anything that could fill the air with this much ambient noise on so many wavelengths."

"Where? Nothings seems out of place here and we took the only tunnel left that leads from here to the surface, aside from Fallen there wasn't anything I saw out of place from when I was...before I was a Guardian."

"Maybe down in Central Dogma…or what's left.," she glanced at her Hunter in concern, Central Dogma was home to one of his most traumatic memories. She didn't even try to read his Light, he had become quite good at calming himself down to a zen like state , times like these she wished Guardians didn't wear helmets since she couldn't see his face "…um…Shinji?"

"Yes?" he raised a brow under his faceplate, she almost never called him by his name.

"Are you…alright?" she asked slowly.

The former Third Child smiled a bit, it was nice to be cared for. "I'm just putting it aside for now, we can think about it later when we're safe"… _'last thing I need_ now _is a mental breakdown, I've gone years without one and I rather not have one in the middle of a fight, thank you.'_

"Ignore it for now, roger dodger."

"Do you think they're trying to set up a new House here?"

"What? Like those crazy House of Exile guys on the Moon?"

"Exactly."

"Hmmm...I hope not, we don't need another gro-wait. They've contacted us, where do we send our Princess?"

"Have her come meet us here, we'll extract on the roof. Prepare the Damsel for a landing."

"Got it…done. Shields are up, weapon's ready and the Damsel is ready to come in on your word, with guns blazing if need be."

"Good." He lined up a kill on a Fallen sniper and fired, taking him (or he thought it was a him) down. "Still, the UN destroyed anything even vaguely useful when the Colapse happened. There's nothing down there but empty space...and maybe a few Khostovs the UN troops left behind."

It wouldn't surprise him if there were a few of those old rifles left, the standard UN rifle during the Golden Age was the first gun of many a Guardian. Shinji himself was among them, given to him by the Guardian who had chosen to escort Mari to Japan on her search for him, much like he was doing now.

Mari 'nodded', she knew that since she was the one who told him years ago. "Still, the tunnels and caverns make a good base, even if there's nothing usable the sheer amount of space is useful in and of itself."

"True enough," Shinji sighed, "notify the Vanguard once we're in the air and clear of interference. They'll probably order more recon here after that, maybe even a strike."

"Planning to volunteer for those missions?"

"…Yeah, I can't give up on her you know?"

"I understand Shinji, I'm behind you all the way!"

"Thanks," Shinji chuckled. Mari didn't really have an option considering she lived in his head but it was nice of her to encourage him regardless.

Shinji then stood up as the 'Princess' was about to move out of the area he could see from the nest they had set up. Quickly he grabbed Monte Carlo and put it on his back before running out of the room, Stillpiercer still in hand and into the room next door, it was at the corner of the building so he had a good wide view. Sadly there wasn't anything he could use to help steady his aim, with the wall seemingly blown off or crumbled into nothing he couldn't even use a windowsill. So instead he crouched at the edge, his cloak and hood fluttering in the wind as Mari flashed and disappeared, they were too exposed for her to be out and floating about.

Scoping down his rifle he found their new friend and he panned to the side, wanting to clear the way for her. He spotted a Vandal and lined up a shot right at the che-

[SHINJI!] he flinched and stopped [look, we have trouble.]

A nav-marker got his attention and he looked into the distance, around one and a half kilometres away…

"…I don't need a scope to see that," he murmured. Even from his far away vantage point he could see the distinct long insect like form of a Fallen Skiff, a dropship. What made him nervous though was what it carried. Underneath, hanging upside down, was the four legged spider like body of a Fallen Walker, complete with the dreaded tank like turret and canon. Even without using either his rifle's scope or the zoom built into his helmet he could see the dropship descending to deploy the Walker on the other side of the devastated Geofront. Shinji sighed, there goes the plan. "Mari we can't have the Damsel pick us up here, we might get shot down."

Shinji scoped down his rifle, again, found the Vandal he was aiming at before and put the alien out of its misery.

"Hopefully that's the only thing in her way," he put down his sniper rifle and Mari flashed it away before shouldering Monte Carlo and flipping off the safety.

[The Damsel could perform an airstrike, blow shit up.]

He shook his head as he stood and hopped off the edge, "I think you're right, there is something happening here." Just before he hit the ground the boosters on the bottom of his boots activated with a loud 'whoosh', cancelling the majority of his downward momentum, before he landed in a crouch. He quickly checked his tracker to see it all calm but he still took a minute and listened for anyone who saw or heard his fall. "These rag-tag band of Fallen shouldn't even have a Walker, who says they have more than one?"

[Good point, so what's the plan? I've had them take a defensive position.]

Shinji hummed in thought as he stored his auto rifle on his back before snapping his fingers as he remembered something. When he was revived himself the Guardian who had come with Mari, a female Warlock called Noir, hadn't left her ship in low orbit like he had left the Damsel. Instead she had actually landed her ship in the Geofront, hiding the jumpship in the caved in ruins of a destroyed warehouse.

He smiled under his helmet, it was the perfect evac site. It was at the opposite end of the Geofront from the walker and safely out of sight, obstructed by crumbling ruins, of its dangerous main canon. The rubble of the warehouse walls were high enough to give him cover and the basement had collapsed, forming a square bowl that the Damsel could go down into. It would provide some cover from any unseen Walkers during the dangerous few seconds the Damsel would need to hover above the ground to pick them up. Add all those things together and you had a _very_ defendable position.

"Remember where Noir-senpai parked her ship?"

[The Crypt Hammer? Yeah, I remember where she parked it.]

"Tell them to go there. It's defensible enough, it'll have to do, we've started to attract attention so we have no time to fight to the surface."

[Yeah these guys have upgraded since then, I don't think we saw a single Captain when we first met.]

Plan in mind he called up rapid transport and a flash of light summoned his S-10V Sparrow, a motorbike-esque jet powered hover bike. He quickly hopped on and the engine roared as he sped off, a tail of flame blazing behind him.

* * *

"This guy…or gal has to make up his mind," Asuka grumbled as a new nav-marker popped up, "I hate this following blindly crap."

As she stood up she saw a reflection of her in a puddle of water and she had to admit she looked _badass._ A flexible armoured suit hugged her form while light armour plates protected her shoulders, thighs, abdomen and the back of her hands. A thick plate of armour protected her chest, while a gleaning silver helmet protected her head and light greaves covered her legs. If this is what the stop gap armour looked like she couldn't wait to try the good stuff.

She chuckled as an amusing thought came to mind, the image of Shinji dressed in a similarly impressive get up, _'finally, he'll be wearing something_ other _than_ _that_ _damn boring school uniform…'_

* * *

*Achoo!* Shinji sneezed. "Ugh, great, now I have to clean the inside of my helmet when this is over."

[That was odd] Mari commented [Guardians can't get sick.]

Shinji frowned as he murmured, "I think someone's talking about me."

* * *

She sped up into a superhuman sprint, her boots thundering with every step, and while she could feel herself gradually getting tired she was going so fast so quickly she couldn't help but smile a bit as she felt like a superhero. Now all she needed was the pilot of Unit-01 beside her, maybe with a cape trailing behind him, and she'd be all set.

She couldn't help but laugh. The Red Devil and…hm, what's a cool name for Shinji?

[Asuka-san, is something the matter?]

"No, Ghost, just some…thoughts on the future."

Eventually they reached a giant foot shaped hole in the ground, it looked to her like a tunnel had collapsed during either her or Shinji's battle here due to the Evas stomping around. There were a few of them under the Geofront's floor she remembered, originally built for servicing the Evangelion launch elevators that lead up to the Geofront, they were also used for transporting various cargo.

She made a mental note to ask Ghost to show her any remaining records of the battle when they were safe. The only thing she really remembered was waking up, getting to her Eva and the fight that followed. What happened before then? Why was Shinji delayed?

Most importantly of all…how did he die?

[I don't know what's in there, I suggest going around but going through there is the fastest route, your call Asuka-san.]

"Fuck it, I'm not scared of no tunnel," she muttered and was about to jump down before she paused. "Ghost, how do you know the rest of the tunnel isn't collapsed from the Evas fighting?"

[Before coming here I made sure to download any maps we had. A few scouting missions had been sent here before and a Guardian had reported using this tunnel a few years ago. That said, creepy dark hole in the ground? I'd expect trouble.]

Asuka nodded, checked her weapon over one more time and took a deep breath…and exhaled. This was it, in that tunnel she was going to face her new enemy for the first time, she could feel it in her blood.

"Ikuhayo, Asuka."

Once more unto the breech.

* * *

Shinji frowned as he noticed the marker on the new Titan disappear from his HUD but ignored it for now as Mari would have said something if she died and he guessed she was too deep underground…or something. Maybe she had found that tunnel he used before?

Cranking on the accelerator his sparrow howled and whirred as he raced down a trench gouged out of the rubble of NERV's final moments, even if the situation was serious and the scenery bleak he couldn't help but smile. Every single Guardian _loved_ their sparrow, regardless of how good it was they were all _fast_ and nimble and the _sound_ they made when you pushed them to the redline? It was music to his ears. As he reached a bend he slammed on the air breaks, leaned to the right and executed a tight drift turn before disengaging the breaks and gunning the throttle again, feeling the G-force push into him as he engaged the sparrow's boost.

As he approached his destination he saw an unlucky Captain walk into the path in front of him. Feeling a little creative, and channeling what he called his 'Inner Asuka', he reached up with his right hand, keeping his left on the controls, and held Monte Carlo. As he closed with the Captain the alien finally noticed the screaming vehicle and turned to face him but it was too late by then. Shinji held the auto rifle and pointed it's bayonet forward like a spear, and aimed right at the massive alien's face.

Before the Fallen could raise his weapon Monte Carlo's blade speared into him like the lance of the mounted cavalry of old. With the force of a mounted guardian screaming forward at roughly 200 kilometres per hour behind it the bayonet easily pierced both shields and armor, the blade running all the way through, only stopped by the dead Fallen's faceplate impacting the gun barrel.

Shinji grunted as the force of the impact pushed against him, the feet of the the alien's limp corpse dragging behind him. He pulled the trigger and fired a burst to obliterate the Captain's head and free his rifle, splattering him and Monte Carlo's pristine white form in alien blood, the Captain's body tumbling behind him.

Obstacle cleared he holstered Monte Carlo on his back again before cranking on the boost to gain the speed he lost due to his impromptu cavalry charge, not wanting to give any Fallen under the Captain's command a chance to even see what killed their leader.

Soon he was at his destination, the collapsed form of a large warehouse, the wall of the Geofront on the other side, meaning he wouldn't have to worry about an attack from behind.

He dismounted his sparrow, which soon disappeared in a flash of light, and made his way to a hill of ruble that some of the collapsed wall had formed, searching for a good firing position. After a few minutes of searching he found a good foxhole and hopped down into it, it was fairly big, deep enough for him to stand and still have plenty of cover. In a flash of light a light blue and gun metal grey belt-fed machine gun appeared in his hands. In a second flash several boxes, each holding a 75 round belt, were on the ground at his feet. It wasn't as rare as most of his other gear but it could still tear targets into ribbons.

It was a Phenomena CSM, a rapid fire machine gun. He preferred the slower firing models that packed more punch per round but this was the best he had.

Shinji placed the heavy weapon on the rubble in front of him before he leaned on the side of his foxhole, crossing his arms and taking a moment to catch his breath and rest. Still, his guard was up as he scanned the ocean of rubble, destroyed vehicles and gouged earth in front of him, waiting for the Fallen to crawl out of their hiding places like cockroaches.

"Where is she?"

* * *

"These tunnels are a lot bigger than I thought they were," Asuka murmured as she walked through the tunnel. It was wide at around four lanes total, two for each direction. She held her Type 89 up while she scanned for threats, keeping her head on a swivel, once again putting her Evangelion training to good use. "What's with the lights though?"

She could see most of the built in lights had long since died, or were destroyed, and instead orange and yellow lights were sloppily hung from and were bolted onto the ceiling, wires trailing off every which way. It was way too disorganized for NERV. That said it _did_ give the tunnel a creepy orange tint as she walked through.

[The Fallen must have built this] her Ghost murmured in her head and she nodded as she once again checked her tracker before checking her six o'clock.

"You sound surprised," she whispered, not wanting to be heard in the hollow silence of the tunnel.

[The Fallen are organized into Noble Houses, very few exist outside of them and those that do are more like rag-tag gangs, unorganized and small. To our knowledge the Fallen here shouldn't be this organized, they shouldn't have the capability to set all of _this_ up.]

"So that's why we haven't seen many?" she whispered back.

[Yes but there's…they have Captains, they're experienced and powerful and hold similar status to human nobility.]

"So why are they here?" she narrowed her eyes, her genius intellect going to work, "if they had it good they shouldn't want to leave and should have no reason to leave one of these Houses."

[They could be disgraced but there still shouldn't be this many of them, Houses would execute them if their crimes are too severe to keep order and prevent them from joining a rival House. Something's fishy here, we need to link up with the other Guardian] he said urgently. [We need to leave _now_ , before we get a nasty surprise. The Vanguard needs to hear about this.]

She nodded and jogged forward, the situation was urgent so she decided to ask about the Vanguard later, concentrating on keeping aware for enemies since she was making a lot more noise now.

* * *

"Mari, where are they now?" The sun was starting to come down now, the sunken floor of the Geofront quickly being washed in shadow. Shinji glanced at his motion tracker and frowned, the fringe of the section right in front of him was lighting up and he guessed the Fallen were coming up the trench he followed in his sparrow. Knowing his break was over he stood up and shouldered his Phenomena CSM, resting the barrel on the rubble in front of him to help keep it steady. It wasn't really necessary, a Guardian's superhuman strength meant that a heavy weapon was more than usable firing from the shoulder. That said firing with support was still much more accurate when firing long sustained bursts, and he had a nagging feeling he was going to be burning through his ammo today. "Don't be afraid to take out more ammo if we need it."

[Gotcha, and they shouldn't be too far now…]

"I hope you're right…" Shinji murmured as, in the distance, he saw the distinct glow of the four eyed fallen through the sight on his machine gun. With his left hand he grabbed the charging handle and racked the action before holding the stock, to help brace him against the weapon. "Here we go Mari…"

A roar echoed in this distance-

[Let's fuck them up!]

-Shinji sighed, before grinning behind his faceplate. He was absolutely sure that out of all the Ghosts out there Mari was the _only_ one who was insane, he didn't mind though.

Even if she did tend to wreck the mood.

As he looked down his sights he saw a small crowd of the two armed dregs charging him, knives coated with lightning in their hands as they screamed, he assumed, bloody murder at him.

Taking aim he pulled the trigger, letting loose a burst of rapid-fire machine gun rounds at 900 round per minute. The Phemonema blazed to life, the blue muzzle flash crackling with lightning as bullets coated in arc light tore through the Dreg's light armor.

"Let's hope they get here quick, as weak as the Fallen in this area are heavy ammo isn't easy to come by."

* * *

Asuka raised and shouldered her rifle, aiming at a group of four dregs in front of her, currently unaware, before she spotted an old truck and sprinted for cover.

*Craaa!*

She grinned when she heard their cry as she slid into cover behind the truck and popped around, seeing a dreg charge her with electric knives she aimed for the head and fired a burst. The full metal jacketed 5.56mm NATO rounds made quick work of the alien's head, ripping it apart and a wisp of white escaped from the now headless body.

Shifting her aim she mowed another one down, before she felt bolts of light slam into her, crackling against her shields.

"Fuck," she went back behind cover before looking up and grinning to herself and, with her new found superhuman strength, she jumped up onto of the truck, surprising the one who shot her. "Say hello to my little-fuck!" she shouted as he shot at her again and she just gunned him down.

"Fucking interrupting me…" she grumbled as she hopped down and reloaded before she froze as she remembered something, "where's the last one?"

She eyed her motion tracker...to see the centre section glowing, _'ABOVE!'_

"FUCK!" she dived forward, dodging the dreg falling from the ceiling with a hairs breath and, not even thinking, she spun around and sent an armored fist straight into the alien's chest. The punch landed with a satisfying 'thump!' and sending it flying into the truck, denting in the metal slightly before the body slumped onto the ground, dead.

Asuka blinked at that, "damn..." she looked down at her fist, a grin on her face, "that was awesome."

[Asuka-san] Ghost chimed in as she loaded a full magazine [I think I found something that might interest you.]

Asuka shrugged, she could definitely use anything she could find. Another nav-marker popped onto her HUD, right at the closed loading gate of the truck she had jumped on top of and used as cover. Walking around to the back she reached for the handle and pulled up…and the rusted handle snapped.

"Oh for fucks sake…" she couldn't help but mumble, how was she going to open it now?...She grinned under her faceplate. She was a clad head-to-toe in a few hundred pounds of armour and had superhuman strength and speed. If she had no way in… "I'll just make one."

Asuka stood back a few paces back before her Ghost seemed to get her idea [might want to put your rifle away, it's not as tough as you are. Put it up against your back, magnets in your armour can hold it in place.]

"Thanks," she did as was suggested before she thundered into a full sprint and, just before she hit the back of the truck, she leapt into the air and crossed her arms in front of her, slamming into the fragile door. The old steel easily broke behind the force of a few hundred pounds of armour and former Eva pilot and Asuka skid to a stop. Ghost flashed into existence over her shoulder, the small drone projecting a cone of light like a flashlight. What greeted her was what she could only describe as a red and black treasure chest, the lid was curved and covered in a few thick hose like wires and green glowing lights.

"A loot stash," her Ghost commented, "let's see what presents our four-eyed friends left us."

She approached it carefully, "there's no chance for it to be booby-trapped?"

"No," the calm, which seemed to be his default natural tone, artificial voice of her Ghost replied. "The Fallen are a greedy bunch, they _love_ to horde and steel, they'd never risk damaging their loot in any way. If it's stolen then they'd just take it back…or that's their logic anyway."

Nodding with satisfaction Asuka opened the chest…and was dazzled by almost blinding blue and white light. Filling the chest was a small stash of cube shaped crystals, emitting the bright glow.

"What is this stuff Ghost?" she asked. "Is it safe to touch?"

"Glimmer, programmable matter," to her that was just gibberish, not surprising considering how far in the future she was. "Perfectly safe to handle and high in demand back home, you can use it to buy all kinds of stuff."

"…so it's just fancy glowing money?"

"…I _suppose_ that's true, as far as most people are concerned."

The glimmer vanished, Asuka wasn't surprised and guessed Ghost had zapped it to wherever he was putting in all the stuff he was picking up, like the ammo he was poofing into her ammo pouches, keeping them full. What _did_ surprise her, pleasantly, was what was at the bottom of the now mostly empty chest.

A big pump-action shotgun.

It wasn't a design she recognized and she guessed it was stolen by the Fallen or scavenged somewhere and had somehow made its way back into the Geofront. The barrel was massive, the smooth bore bigger than the 12-gauge shotguns she'd seen some of the base security in Germany wielding during her stay in NERV's Hamburg base. The barrel was black in colour, and so was the pistol grip, stock and the slide and pump under the barrel. The receiver was a simple white and the weapon had simple iron sights.

Picking it up with a smile information flowed into her head. It was a Preacher Mk. I, a simple and common but powerful and popular shotgun with a four round capacity.

"Now _this_ is what I'm talking about!" she couldn't help but cheer. She _always_ wanted to shoot a shotgun, sadly the arsenal Evangelions wielded didn't include giant shotguns. She had even tried to get Misato to have NERV commission a giant shotgun, or at least program one into the simulators for trials, but it had never worked out.

At last her dream comes true.

"Not a lot of ammo left for it though," she only had four shells, all of them already loaded in the gun as her ammo counter indicated, the shotgun's supply appearing under her Type-89's.

A flash at the edge of her motion tracker got her attention. It didn't surprise her, in fact she was somewhat expecting someone to say 'hello' after she killed the four dregs, they seemed too light security for a loot cash.

Seeing the enemy come closer on her tracker she leapt into action, leaping out of the truck, her shotgun held at the ready. As she soared through the air a strange flying drone greeted her, it was larger than her Ghost, as wide as her shoulders. It's main body had three yellow eyes, one engine pod was attached on either side while a gun was slung underneath, the name 'Shank' was above it on her HUD.

She pulled the trigger and fired a blast of buckshot into the drone, the massive shotgun shoving into her shoulder, the force clear even through her armour. The shank exploded as she landed on her side with a grunt. A dreg came into view, two lightning coated knives in hand, a vandal with a long rifle right behind.

Quickly she rolled to a stand and sent her fist into the dreg's face, the force caving it in and sending the body flying into the vandal who dodged and aimed at her. The muzzle blazed to life, electricity arcing around the barrel as the weapon prepared to fire. Asuka charged as the weapon fired, the bolt from rifle flaring against her shields, taking a fair bit out of them. She ignored them and closed, grabbing the barrel of the rifle as it cycled again and shoved it to the side before kicking her foe to the ground, the force making the vandal let go of his weapon. Asuka tossed the rifle aside as she put her foot down on the vandal's chest, pinning it, before she chambered another shell, the ejected shell clacking onto the floor.

Deciding not to fire off a one liner this time she aimed point blank and pulled the trigger, blasting the head off the vandal.

She was about to complain about using half of her ammo supply when she noticed the ammo counter of the shotgun indicated she now had 6 rounds in reserve.

[I can forge ammo for you from bits of some of our enemies' equipment] his voice chimed in which surprised her, she hadn't known he had popped back into her head. [I can't do it all the time though since I can't always find the right components and it takes a few enemies to collect enough so I suggest using your shotgun ammo wisely. I can make ammo for your rifle too but the materials for your shotgun ammunition aren't as common.]

"Huh," she couldn't help but find her Ghost extremely convenient as she loaded a shell, racked the pump to chamber the round, and loaded a fourth shell into the tube. "I think we're going to get along just fine Ghost."

* * *

' _No end to them,'_ Shinji thought with a frown as more Fallen surged forward.

He held down the trigger, filling the air with a storm of lead, the arc rounds leaving streaks of blue light as they tore through the air and shredded their targets. Shinji had been forced to shift his shooting stance, his left hand no longer supporting the stock, instead it supported the ammunition belt. Having chosen to eschew reloading due to the sheer volume of enemies Mari was now floating at the bottom of the foxhole, transmatting ammo belts directly and connecting them onto each other instead of in the usual portable ammunition boxes. It meant he could fire without stopping but he had to support the belt to keep the gun feeding properly. He could see the heat coming off of the barrel shroud, the cooling gel that usually kept the barrel cool being overwhelmed as Shinji did his best impression of a first world war machine gunner mowing down enemy troops as they charged through no-man's land.

If this kept going he'd be forced to stop to change barrels, assuming his ammunition didn't run out.

As he mowed down another charge of suicidal dregs it seems like his prayers were answered…and finally he could let go of the trigger.

"All's quiet on the Western Front," Mari commented as she floated up over his shoulder to look over the battlefield with him. In front of them was a small sea of bodies, Dregs, Vandals, the wrecks of several dozen Shanks and even a few Captains, some having come as close as a dozen metres. The rubble around him was scarred with scorch marks and the signs of battle. "I thought it'd never end."

"Yeah…" he couldn't help but sigh in relief as he looked down at the floor of his foxhole, covered in links from the belts and empty brass casings. Reaching down to his belt he unclipped a water bottle, opened it, and poured the water over the Phenomena's barrel, the water instantly evaporating with a hiss. "Where's our Titan friend?"

Mari vanished back inside his head as her voice entered his mind [not too far now.]

A nav-marker popped up in the distance, his Ghost having taken the liberty to put the nickname 'Princess' right beside it on his HUD.

"Really Mari…" Shinji held back a sigh at her antics. He smiled in relief though to see the new Guardian still alive and back on the surface. Something in the distance got his attention, in the air, approaching at concerning speeds were the unforgettable silhouettes of a pair of Fallen Skiffs. "Damnit. Mari clean up the CSM," the machine gun vanished in a flash of light and and he hopped out of the foxhole.

Static cover would just attract the fire from the gunships, he needed to keep mobile to dodge their fire and the grenades they rained down to clear their drop zones. He called up his light and a trip-mine grenade appeared in his left hand. The explosive device looked similar to the old German hand grenades used during the World Wars, the explosive head attached to a long handle. Reaching behind him with his right hand he grabbed Monte Carlo and held the auto-rifle at his side.

"Call down the Damsel, have her target those Skiffs, looks like you get your airstrike Mari-chan."

[Hell yes!...She can't get down here in time to stop them from dropping off their troops though, you _do_ know that, right?]

"I can take them on just fine," he casually flipped the tripmine in his hand, his voice holding a calm confidence that anyone from his old life would have found alien. After being a Guardian for a few years though this was just another day in the office really. "I just want the dropships' guns taken out."

* * *

"FINALLY!" Asuka shouted as she reached the top of the stairs, exiting the tunnel and into the crumbling lobby of some building she didn't recognized. In her hands she held her Type-89, her new shotgun resting on her back.

A new nav-marker popped up on her HUD.

[Almost there, let's double time, the Fallen _really_ don't want us to leave. They've been assaulting our evac-point for awhile now.]

"Scheiße!" Asuka ran out of the lobby and saw a trench gouged into the earth.

[Follow it! Let's go!]

"Right," Asuka hopped down and doubled time, running as fast and as hard as she could, her steps shaking the ground as she thundered forward.

A pair of long insect like ships flew overhead, "what are those Ghost?"

[Dman, dropships, Fallen Skiffs, not good.]

As her destination finally came into view, the collapsed ruins of some building, her breathing was starting to become labored but she pressed onward, knowing that those ships were probably the first of many. In front of her the two Skiffs hovered two stories above the ground, a dozen fallen dropping out of them, each group lead by a Captain.

It was then she finally saw the Guardian who had been covering her all this time as he, she assumed it was a he, hopped out of cover. He was fairly slim, judging by his build and height she guessed they were the same age as her. Their armour was lighter than hers, armour plates only covering a few important parts but even at this distance she could tell her new comrade's black, violet and green armour (a fan of Shinji's she guessed) was more intricate and advanced than hers.

What really caught her attention though was the flowing blue cloak. Damn, when she got her Baka back she was getting this person to teach him a thing or two about style.

The Skiffs opened fire, the caped Guardian dodging and weaving as the large blue energy bolts exploded around him. He threw something at both of the Captains, sticking onto their fronts before they exploded, turning the two into mist and shredding the troops who stood in front of them, wiping out most of the landed Fallen. The herd successfully thinned he started firing at the dazed survivors with an automatic rifle.

[Damn] her Ghost commented [that was…impressive.]

Asuka couldn't help but agree as she surged forward, out of the trench. She came across what could only be described as a killing field, bodies of dead Fallen everywhere. It really seemed like this more experienced Guardian knew their stuff, he was a venerable murder machine from what she'd seen.

A pair of missiles screamed from above and slammed into the Fallen ships, exploding in to two brilliant blazing fireballs.

"Hell yeah!" Asuka couldn't help but cheer, what could she say, she _loved_ explosions.

A bronze blur roared overhead shortly after, too fast for her too see anything aside from the flaming exhaust of the engines, diving down into the cover of the destroyed warehouse.

[That's our ride!]

"No, really!" she couldn't help snap with sarcasm as she finally reached the warehouse. Her fellow Guardian seemed to notice her as he waved her over and fell back behind the wall of rubble and rusted steel.

Using her superhuman strength she jumped half-way up the wall and started to climb up.

[Asuka! Behind!] she turned to see the sight of another Fallen Skiff racing down at them.

"Oh you have got to be kidding me!" She climbed up as fast as she could as the Skiff opened fire, the blue energy bolts smashing into the wall just as she jumped over the top and to the other side.

Her fellow Guardian waited for her, his white autorifle aimed at the top of the wall, his cloak fluttering in the wind.

Hovering above him was the gleaming bronze form of, what looked to be, a futuristic fighter plane. It was bug, larger than any fighter plane she had ever seen with a pair of swept back wings and two small vertical fins near the tail end of the ship, at the base of the wings, angled diagonally outwards while a larger swept back vertical one was mounted to the middle of the ship. What she assumed was the cockpit was placed in between a long two-pronged nose. Well she guessed it was the cockpit, it was covered in black metal and not glass so she assumed cameras let the pilot see from inside. Two rectangular missile pods were mounted on the top of the hull, where the body met the wings. A pair of single-barrel canons with a three pronged barrel were mounted on top of the hull on either side of the cockpit while a third one was mounted under the cockpit. Another pair of, what she assumed were weapon pods considering how heavily armed the ship was, were mounted on the underside.

Asuka had to admit she was damned impressed with the ship, hoping that one day when she came to get Shinji back she'd have something as impressive to pick him up with.

On the side of the hull, near the cockpit, written in white was what she guessed the ship was named.

"Quite Content Damsel, huh? Damn," she whistled, "paint it red and-"

A trio of roars from behind her snapped her out of her reverie and she spun, rifle at the ready to the site of three captain standing on top of the wall, the white Skiff hovering behind them. Her mind raced as she saw the two chin-mounted turrets aim at the ship behind her, looking to destroy their means of escape.

A crack of energy answered her prayer, sounding as if Aries himself had crashed down from Olympus behind her. Glancing over her shoulder she saw her fellow Guardian, his form covered in yellow fire and in his hand was a massive revolver, blazing like the sun itself.

He fired once, twice, three times and three beams of light flew over her head with the sound of thunder, their passing reverberating through her armour and into the air in her lungs, each shot leaving a sizzling trail through the air.

Turning forward again she saw one of the Captain's disintegrate in a shower of yellow light, flames and ash as the dropship's guns were no more, nothing but fire and molten metal.

Automatic gunfire roared from behind her, shredding the two Captains' shields and she took that as her cue to run for it, she couldn't die here, Shinji was counting on her! Spinning on her heels she ran for the ship which, worriedly, hadn't dropped a ramp or anything for them to use to get inside.

Then in a flash of light her fellow Guardian disappeared.

"What the?" she was so surprised she skid to stop. "Where did he-" a rapid flashing light from the corner of her HUD caught her attention and she glanced at her motion tracker.

To see an enemy coming from behind!

"Fuck!" she dove forward, a lightning covered blade swinging where her head used to be.

Then there was a flash of white light and the Titan was gone. Passengers picked up the Quite Content Damsel pitched up, thrusters blazing to life as she shot up into the sky, vaporizing the unfortunate Captain who got too close.

* * *

*clang!*

Shinji flinched at the sound and raised his brow, what in Pen-Pen's name was that? He turned around and cringed at the sight of the female Guardian on the ground, her faceplate up against the wall of the Damsel's cargo bay. Not exactly the most dignified pose he had to admit and he could feel the Titan's silent embarrassment from where he was standing…where he could also see a small dent caused by the impact on the steel grey wall.

The former Eva pilot sighed inside, the dent he could see was going to be awkward to explain to Amanda, the resident head shipwright back home. Well at least she didn't smash into his sparrow resting at the opposite end of the cargo compartment, that was a _lot_ more fragile than his beloved Damsel.

Mari then flashed beside his head as she materialized and he could just see her grinning from ear to ear in amusement…metaphorically of course, she didn't _have_ a mouth to grin with. He could even see her shaking slightly as if she was fighting her body to keep in her laughter, which of course was just some acting on her part. Shinji was actually sure the cheerful little drone had just muted herself.

"Puppy-kun," she turned to him and he could practically hear a cat grin in her voice. "I'll be in the cockpit," the door opened in front of her and she floated off, chuckling silently in his head.

Shinji just sighed at his Ghosts antics, he was pretty sure the new Titan didn't appreciate the amusement in her tone. He was also pretty sure no other Guardian had to deal with a Ghost like his Mari. Still, he couldn't help but smirk behind his helmet, _'I wouldn't change her for the world.'_

He then turned around to go to the cockpit himself, the Damsel could fly itself just fine but he loved flying. As he walked up to the door to the rest of the small ship he turned to the Titan who was starting to stand up, feeling a little bad she had ended up in such an embarrassing position.

So, before he left the Titan to gather herself he said the only thing that came to mind.

"Sorry."

* * *

Asuka froze as the door hissed and clicked close.

"It couldn't be…" she murmured, her bright blue eyes wide.

'Sorry', how many times had she heard _him_ say that word? She was intimately familiar with every possible way he could say it, or she liked to think she was.

And the way that Guardian had said it…it was so familiar. The tone, the softness, _everything_ about it reminded her of…of _him._ She could feel herself shake, _'no it can't be…no…'_

She shook her head, everything about her life had taught her that if something was too good to be true then it was. But…it was him, there was no doubt in her mind.

She eyed the door as she stood up and took off her helmet, her fiery red locks finally flowing free.

"It's you, isn't it? Shinji..."

The image of Unit-01's fallen form flashed in her mind...and tears rolled down her cheeks as she smiled.

Her Baka was alive.

 **Chapter 3: Reunion II (Cohabitation Part 2)**

 **AN**

Damn, sorry this was so late guys. I wanted to get this out prior to Rise of Iron's release but work got in the way and then Rise of Iron released and...well, great DLC, lot's of fun.

Need I say more? Hahaha

Well here it is guys, the next chapter of Fireteam Tokyo. Wow, a lot longer than I thought it would be. I've always thought of this as a short series, keeping chapters around 4-6k in length, not my usual 8-10k but oh well.

I know a lot of people may be upset about the ending but I really wanted to cut it off here. This chapter had a lot of fighting and next chapter will FINALLY have Shinji and Asuka reunite. So next chapter will be much more mellow and full of WAFF, with Shinji helping Asuka settle in at The Tower and, as the next chapter's name indicate, they live together again.

Also to anyone that may be afraid Shinji is a little too OOC please keep in mind that A) he's in the middle of a mission this chapter and B) he's been a Guardian for a few years and that's changed him. Asuka and you guys will get to see what Shinji is like now in the next chapter, so wait until then for your judgement please.

Anyway, that's all for now. I'm going to go and play some more Rise of Iron.

Stay safe, Guardians.


	3. Reunion II

**Hello all, LATE Merry Christmas and Happy Dawning to all of you. Yes as it sounds this was supposed to be a Christmas chapter, sadly life meant that I couldn't finish this in time. Sorry but we hope you all enjoy it regardless ^^**

 **-Maniac & WG**

* * *

"Normal Dialogue"

 _'Thoughts'_

[Ghost telepathically talking directly to their Guardian]

* * *

Also a bit of clarifying to prevent any confusion. All dialogue is in **English** unless otherwise specified. I'm just going to go on a limb and assume that the common language in The City is English since groups like Future War Cult and Sparrow Racing League have banners that shorten themselves to FWC and SRL and I am _assuming_ , those banners stay the same in the game's different language versions. Other languages are still spoken (since I assume Ghosts can act as something akin to universal translators when necessary and since there are other languages written on the tower), for example Asuka's Ghost uses Japanese suffixes and so does Shinji, who also uses the term 'senpai' in regular speech.

So yeah, just assume it's English unless specified for the sake of simplicity.

Enjoy!

* * *

 **Chapter 3: Reunion II (Cohabitation Part 2)**

Shinji closed his eyes as he sighed and placed Monte Carlo on his back as the door to the cockpit closed behind him with a hiss and a click. Opening his eyes he entered the Damsel's cockpit, the large wrap around monitor taking the place of a glass canopy displaying the beautiful star filled night sky. The sky was clear tonight, the stars in the sky glittering like a sea of diamonds in the darkness.

A small smile worked its way onto his face at the sight. He had come to find some enjoyment in fighting, that's true, he _loved_ riding his sparrow, also true, but Shinji's favourite thing to do as a Guardian?

Flying, there was simply _nothing_ like it.

Mari was there too of course, just like she had said, resting herself on top of the pilot's headrest. Her light was off, the small drone seemingly doing her best impression of a napping cat.

Contrary to the often cramped cockpits of 21st century jet fighters the cockpit of the _Quite Content Damsel_ was cozy but quite roomy, the larger vessel having the room for it. The cockpit itself was a two-seater, the second seat behind the first and slightly above, in the same layout as the old VTOL gunships of his era. Unlike the aircraft of the past though there was enough room around the back seat to walk around it to get to the front seat, which all the controls were centred around. With the advanced auto-pilot software developed during the Golden Age and improved by Amanda Holliday, and the presence of Mari, the _Damsel_ was more than capable of flying herself so the second seat was just for passengers, not a co-pilot.

Shinji reached up and put his hood down before reaching for his helmet and taking it off, the air-tight seal breaking with a hiss, revealing the face of Shinji Ikari, former Third Child of NERV, Hunter of the Vanguard. His face was young, not all that different from his face at 14. His skin was noticeably less tanned than before, a result of how much time he spent in his armour or covering his head with a hood when outdoors. His blue eyes were a bit sharper but still held mostly softness, something Mari had always worked to keep, and full of a hopeful quality they had never had before when he was an Evangelion pilot. His brown hair was slightly longer than how it used to be, a result of his own laziness more than an actual stylistic choice.

The small drone floated up off the seat as he made his way forward, flashing away his helmet and the rifle on his back.

"Thanks," he mumbled before sitting in the pilot's seat with a content sigh. He had to hand it to Mari, using some of his hard earned glimmer to upgrade the livability of the _Damsel_ , like the quality of the seats, was probably one of the best ideas his insane Ghost had ever had.

Probably her sole sane one too.

"You're welcome Puppy, after today I think you've earned the right to relax properly."

"Not our toughest fight though. Other than the numbers they weren't so bad," he commented and closed his eyes, taking a minute to relax. "They'd stand no chance if the House of Devils attacked."

"True enough, sadly I don't think our friends are nice enough to kill each other off. Oh, by the way I sent a report about the strange Fallen activity to the Vanguard." Shinji gave a silent nod of acknowledgement and Mari internally frowned. They had been through fights with tougher enemies, even ones that came in greater numbers before but she'd never seen him look as tired as he does now. "Shinji," she used his proper name with no suffixes to convey her serious concern, "are you alright? I can fly for you if you want you know."

"Just…" he sighed and when he spoke his voice was weary and exhausted. "I'm just tired, is all. Now that I can calm down and think…mentally I'm tired, Mari. Seeing it all again…seeing Unit-02 again…" his voice cracked and he took a deep breath "…I _miss_ her, you know?"

"I know..." she replied, her voice almost a whisper "…I understand." She really did, she wasn't quite sure, even after their time together, whether he knew how much he missed the Second Child but she did know. After all, he sometimes called her name out in his sleep…she wasn't sure if he knew that either. "Do…do you want to take a nap, Shinji?"

The young man in question couldn't help but smile at her worry, it was nice to be cared for that was for sure. "No…I just want to take a minute to just…rest. Our fresh Titan may have questions for me…if I do fall asleep though, please keep an eye on the _Damsel_ for me."

"Sure!"

"That means _no funny business_ Mari, no sharp turns, no rolls, loops, dives or sudden climbs."

"Mou…" he could imagine her pouting if she was human, "you never let me have any fun!"

"Our new friend isn't strapped…in…"

"Hm, fair enough." She 'nodded' in agreement, "hey Puppy I got a question. Do you have an idea who the Princess might be?"

"…"

"Puppy-kun?" she turned towards her Hunter and saw his head tilted the side, mouth slightly open, sound asleep. "Huh," she smiled in internally. "I hope you have a nice nap, you've earned it."

Silently she shut down the cockpit's canopy display and speakers.

* * *

"That was him…" Asuka murmured as she stood, her previous embarrassment forgotten, staring at the closed door in shock.

In fact she was so shocked that several minutes had passed without her noticing, worrying her Ghost.

[Asuka-san, who's him? Did you recognize the voice?] his concerned tone snapped her out of her stupor. [It's been a _very_ long time, the odds of it being some-]

"It's him."

[…are you sure?]

"…yeah, I am." She could hear the doubt in his voice, not surprising considering how much time had passed since she was alive but…but she was _sure_ of it.

Asuka took off her helmet, sending her long fiery looks flowing free once more as she took a deep breath in an attempt to calm herself as she walked towards the door. Ghost decided it was the right time to materialize beside her, flashing her helmet away as he did so.

She stopped at the door, her heart felt like it was ready to jump out of her chest.

"Uh…are you alright Guardian?" Ghost floated into her vision and even without a face Asuka could somehow…sense his worry, not just hear it.

"I-I'm…fine…yeah, fine."

"Um…your breathing doesn't sound fine, Asuka-san."

She blinked at that and she realized he was right, she was almost hyperventilating. The redhead shook her head _hard_ , what the fuck was she worried about? This was Shinji, the biggest softie she's ever met. She used to be an Evangelion pilot, she'd fought the Angels for fucks sake! She was _the_ great Asuka Langley Soryu, genius Japanese-German prodigy!

…

And she was fucking _terrified._

All kinds of scenarios blasted through her brain, lists of things she could say and his possible reactions. Her genius mind, for the first time she could remember, backfired on her as worst case scenario after worst case scenario sped through her imagination.

What if he hated her? The last months of the Angel War were a blur to her after…that one Angel but before that she remembered her treatment of him pretty damn well. For months after they met she had hurled abuse at Shinji, put him down again and again. What he done to deserve it? _Nothing_. He cooked for her, cleaned her home and clothes, even when hurt, even when depressed he had always done his duties with no real complaint as long as he was physically able.

If she was in his shoes Asuka would hate herself, that's for sure.

She wasn't _always_ mean to him though. There were a few good moments between them to be sure but as she stood there in the _Damsel_ she suddenly found it hard to remember even one.

"Um…" her Ghost turned to the door and back to her. "Are we-"

"…fuck it."

"Uh-"

"Fuck. It." She took a deep breath, she was Asuka Langley Soryu for fucks sake! She woke up in the middle of some post-apocalyptic future and what had she done? She did what she always did to solve her problems, she charged ahead! She fought some aliens she never knew existed until she saw one, kicked their asses and stole their stolen shotgun. Just like earlier she was just going to go forward…and hope for the best.

She opened the door, Ghost following behind, and walked into the cockpit. It was dark, no screens or glass canopy apparent to her, just soft lighting coming from where the floor met the walls keeping her from bumping into anything. Scanning quickly she realized Shinji was sitting on the front seat, faced away from her.

Before she could call out to him the pink Ghost from earlier floated up from behind his seat, the small little drone's green eye 'blinked' when it saw her, as if in surprise.

"Holy shit…" the Ghost…breathed out? It was hard to tell with the artificial voice filter the things seemed to share, although this one, Mari she absently remembered her Ghost telling her before, sounded a bit more human than her own. "Y-You're _her_ …Asuka Langley Soryu, Second Child of NERV…right?"

"Y-Yeah…you recognize me?"

"I've seen pictures… _holy shit_."

"T-Then is…" she pointed at the occupied chair with a shaky finger, "is that…is that?"

"Shinji…" Mari 'blinked', "oh Speaker's balls-"

"Interesting phrase," her Ghost murmured.

"-I should wake him." Mari floated down and mentally cursed the fact the Traveler did not design her kind with fucking arms for her to nudge him awake with. First she decided to call out to him, "Shinji. Shinji…Puppy-kun wake up." He murmured but…nothing, figures, the one time he decided to be a heavy sleeper…

Time for Plan B. She flew forward, thumping against his face.

That woke him.

"Bwah?!" he fell off his seat and sat up, glaring at his Ghost. "Mari, what the hell?"

"Um…" Mari motioned toward the new Guardian, "I think you might know Princess…"

His eyes widened and he shot up on his feet…and what he saw made him freeze.

"A…Asuka…" he breathed out, her name feeling strange on his tongue after so many years. He felt his eyes start to water as he walked to the back of the cockpit, facing her, just an arm's length away. The Hunter could barely believe his eyes, and he prayed to whatever was out there that he wasn't hallucinating.

She was taller, more grown up than he remembered, wasn't too surprising considering the same happened to him after he was revived several years ago. Her hair was still as beautiful as he remembered, red like fire, maybe even more so, and it freely flowed past her shoulders, her neural clips gone. She was clad in simple Titan armour and he couldn't help but think it suited her, both the look of it and the Titan class' nature itself. She had always been the fiercest warrior he'd known.

What was surprising to him was her face, he hadn't known what to expect…but the storm of shock, surprise, and _joy_ had not been it.

Asuka was no better as she stared at him, drinking him in. He was older, and much more handsome, but she could still see that soft tender nature she had always associated with him.

He sure as hell dressed a lot better than what she remembered that was for sure, he did the cape look good.

She then realized she didn't know what to say, an ocean of emotions crashing inside her. Joy of course, he was _alive_ for fucks sake, just a few hours ago she had been afraid she'd never see his beautiful blue eyes again, never sample his cooking again…never hear that soft voice that made her feel funny again. Hell, just ten minutes ago she would have killed to hear him apologize. With that joy, there was also shock of course, Ghost told her of his death and he sounded certain, she could feel her drone's shock even now through the link they appeared to share.

Asuka being Asuka though there was one more emotion, her seeming default in times of uncertainty, her companion in life, _anger._ It was an odd anger, she wasn't mad at him per se, she still remembered her one sided promise that she'd give him a kiss in person once they met again and a big part of her wanted to follow through with it still. No, what she was mad about was the fact that he died. She couldn't explain it but the thought of him trying to save her, the bitch that abused him for months, only to be brutally murdered himself made her _mad_. It was a strange irrational anger, aimed at him for dying and fate for killing them both. It was also aimed at herself for being somewhat happy because if he didn't die trying to save her then he would have died of old age long ago, maybe out of her reach forever.

She stepped towards him and Shinji opened his mouth-

*SMACK!*

"Ow!" Shinji recoiled from the hit before gingerly putting a hand up to his stinging cheek and turning back to Asuka, "what was that for?!"

"For dying you _BAKA!_ " she screamed, brought up her hand and-

*SMACK!*

"What was _that_ for?!" Shinji rubbed his now red cheek. Over his years as a Hunter of the Vanguard he had felt much worse, smacked around by Cabal Phalanxes with their stupid and annoying shields, tossed around by explosions and even thrown by an Ogre once but that didn't mean her slaps didn't hurt.

"That's…that's…" Asuka trailed off as she looked at the floor, the shadows of her fringe covering her eyes and he could hear her rapid breathing, tears dripping onto the cold floor of his ship.

Shinji cringed at the sight, one heck of a hero he was, making the girl cry.

' _Come on Shinji,_ ' he thought to himself, _'didn't you tell yourself you weren't going to let her down anymore? That you would be there to support her?'_ The Hunter took a deep breath and walked towards Asuka. One step. Two steps…he was happy to see she hadn't slapped him aga-

*SMACK!*

"Ow!" _okay_ maybe he spoke too soon.

"…" Asuka murmured something he couldn't hear and Shinji blinked in surprise.

"Ah…can…can you repeat that?"

She looked up at him, glaring with fire burning in her blue eyes.

"Do you know how you made me feel? _HUH?!"  
_

"Wha-"

"Do you _know_ how I felt when I saw Unit-01 the way it was?!" She stomped toward him and into his personal space making him back up until his back thumped against the wall, tears forming in her eyes again. "I thought I'd never see you again!" She looked down and, much to his surprise, hugged him desperately as if she was afraid he would disappear. Her voice dropped to a whisper… "I thought I was going to be alone again."

Asuka shivered as she cried, forgetting her promise to herself to never show weakness for a moment. She remembered seeing his Eva there in the Geofront, dead and decomposed, thinking Shinji's corpse laid within. The body of one of the only people who had shown he cared for her. The body of the boy who cooked her meals, cleaned her home and clothes, who had _jumped into a volcano for her_ all without a word of thanks.

She clung to him tighter as she sobbed, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry…I'm sorry…I'm so sorry…"

Shinji sighed as he leaned his head back and felt the cold metal of the ship's inner hull, not knowing what she would possibly be apologizing for, as he thought about what to do. He'd matured over the years but his social skills were still _sorely_ lacking, a result of his preference to lone wolf over working in fireteams when possible coupled with his anti-social nature.

Then an idea came to him and he gingerly, with great care as to not get slapped again, embraced the trembling and crying form of Unit-02's former pilot.

He had, for years, dreamed of the day he would return to Tokyo-3's ruins to reunite with Asuka, the one person he felt he had truly failed in his life. It was at times the only thing other than Mari's companionship that made life bearable, especially during his early days in the Vanguard when he didn't know anyone. During those years he had come up with all sorts of scenarios that could play out.

Getting slapped three times was not one of them. Still, Asuka was back and that was _all_ that mattered.

"Sorry, Asuka."

"Gott," he heard chuckle into his shoulder, "stop apologizing…Baka."

* * *

"I do hope you're relationship with Princess is going to be a _tad_ more gentle after this, Puppy."

Shinji glanced behind him at the passenger's seat. Asuka was there, sitting in her armour sans helmet, clearly asleep, having knocked out soon after she sat down. He couldn't blame her, she had just been revived from the dead to a veritable brand new world, straight smack dab in enemy territory to boot, only to find out he was actually alive and well. As someone who had gone through basically the same ordeal he could relate, he slept on his trip to The City too…although his seat had been a bit more embarrassing than Asuka's.

His ride then did not have a second seat in the cockpit.

Shinji then turned back to Mari, a small smile on his face, "I hope so too." He stood up and with a thought his helmet appeared in his hand again and the young man couldn't help but look at it with a bit of irritation before he sighed, "might as well get this over with…" Turning to his Ghost, "Mari you're in charge so I want you to keep an eye on Asuka for me. I'm sure you remember how rough out first day together was for me, so _please_ just let her sleep… _peacefully_ Mari. No funny business, I _mean_ it."

"Oh, and where are you going?"

"Still have to clean the inside of my helmet, remember?...I might as well shower while I'm at it too."

* * *

"What an interesting day…" Mari murmured to herself as she hovered around the cockpit, watching the stars using the same cameras that normally fed the _Damsel_ 's panoramic monitor. The two Guardians were asleep now, Shinji having returned looking a bit refreshed a while ago, so she didn't really have anything to do. The _Damsel_ was basically flying itself at this point, she was just keeping an eye out since her Guardian didn't want her doing anything fun, which was unfair in her opinion.

She was making sure she followed a safe flight path, away from any known hostile locations that may want to take few pot shots at the _Damsel_. The sky was clear too, no clouds or light pollution to hide the stars from her, the _Damsel's_ current subsonic speed making her stargazing that much easier, no need to inform anyone below of their presence with a sonic boom after all.

"I have no idea how humans enjoy this shit…" she couldn't help but complain, she was so _bored_ just staring at the sky _._ Luckily though she was nearing The City. "Note to self, download a game or something so I have _something_ to do next time."

Soon enough the _Damsel_ crossed City controlled airspace, Mari double checked the ship's identification friend-or-foe system, or IFF, to see if it was broadcasting properly.

A blip on her sensors soon made itself known, a two ship formation from the City Defense Force, and the pair sent her a challenge.

"The long night."

"Ends when the dawn comes."

"IFF and challenge confirmed, you may proceed, we will now transfer you over to City control. Welcome home." Immediately the ships on her sensors turned away, probably back to their normal patrol route.

"QCD-01," a clearly female air traffic control officer contacted her, "this is City control…"

* * *

"Puppy-kun, wake up."

Something bumped against his cheek and Shinji couldn't help but let out an annoyed groan before swatting Mari away gently and opening his eyes. He could see that he wasn't in a burning crater in the ground, which was good, at least Mari didn't wake him up due to some emergency. After a few more moments the young man finally woke up fully and he realized the sound of the _Damsel_ 's engines were absent, in fact he could hear the muffled sounds of machinery running coming from outside. Coupled with the fact that he couldn't feel the _Damsel_ flying anymore he guessed they'd landed.

"We home, Mari?"

"Yuppers! Docked in our space and everything," she flashed back into his head. [Now we just need to wake the Princess and we can head home.]

"Right," Shinji stretched with a yawn before getting up and turning around to Asuka. The newly 'born' Guardian was just as he left her it seemed, still slumped slightly to the side and soundly asleep, Mari's loud voice having done nothing to wake her. _'Well she was always a deep sleeper. I wonder if she picked that up from her time living with Misato?'_

[You don't want to wake her, do you?]

No, no he did not. "She looks so peaceful…I don't think I've ever seen her like this before…" he commented quietly, barely above a whisper.

[D'awww, you are _adorable_ , you know that? If you showed that side more often I don't think you'll get as much flak as you do now from Cade, you know?...or it could be the reverse, Cayde is hard to read.]

"Cayde-senpai is…an odd one."

[Anyway stop wasting time ogling at your girlfriend Puppy-kun, I can tell you're tired too, let's just wake her already and head home. She can have the couch; we'll deal with getting her a place tomorrow or something. Seriously, if I didn't know better you're scared to wake her.]

'Well _that's not_ untrue _. Even during the good early days of the war Asuka was always a bit…volatile when woken up, especially when she was having a good night of sleep.'_ His mind flashed back to the one time she had sleep walked to his bed, when he saw her cry in her sleep. _'Nightmares must have hit her harder than I thought…'_ He shook his head and sighed, "well I could just carry her."

[ _Oh-hooo~_ ] Shinji could practically _hear_ Mari grinning in his head as his face heated up from her teasing tone [when did my Hunter get so _bold?!_ ]

"Oh fuck off…um…" he trailed off, not really sure what to call Asuka's Ghost. Now that he thought about it, in the several years he'd spent in the Vanguard he had never actually referred to another Ghost before. Oh sure he'd _spoken_ to other Ghosts beside Mari but it was usually after they'd already chimed in and he would just talk _to_ them, never having to call out to them. "Ghost-san?...uh Asuka's Ghost?"

A small flash of light beside Asuka's head revealed the little drone, the plain white shell making the veteran pair a bit nostalgic of their own early adventures. "Yes Hunter?"

"Um, well I can't carry Asuka with all that armour so could you…"

"…Oh! Yes, of course. Thank you for being so considerate." In a soft flash of light the heavy armour plates that protected Asuka disappeared, leaving the armoured body suit underneath. It was somewhat form fitting, but still thick and padded, with some malleable armour plates to provide excellent protection.

It was _far_ better than the plugsuits had been, those left almost nothing to the imagination.

Shinji couldn't help but compare it to the body suit that he wore, it was considerably more bulky than his. The Hunter's suit of synth leather had some ballistic padding but no armour plates built into it of any kind.

He hoped her suit wasn't too heavy, he didn't want to waste her Ghost's effort to try and make this easier…well that and he did _not_ want to wake her up to get slapped a fourth time but he wasn't exactly the biggest Guardian either. It also didn't help that Hunter armour didn't give a big boost to arm strength, that was a Titan thing.

Shinji bent down to lift her up in a princess carry…and was surprised to find her lighter than he thought she would be with all the gear on. Oh she wasn't light, Titans were _fucking heavy_ , but it was doable. He doubted he would be able to carry her with the denser materials of better Titan armour though.

"Alright," he grunted and adjusted his hold on her, "let's go home."

* * *

"Ngghh…" Asuka groaned as she stirred awake. As she opened her eyes she was surprised that instead of being greeted to the sight of the _Damsel_ 's steel gray hull what she saw was a clean white ceiling.

The next thing she realized was that she was in a bed, a very _soft_ bed, and covered in a warm blanket. For a moment she wanted nothing more than to sink into the mattress, surrender herself into the warmth and comfort that surrounded her.

Then she finally remembered what had happened at the ruins of Tokyo-3. The aliens, the dead Evas, the fighting and Shinji was _alive._

She looked beside her and realised the bed was _big_ , more than enough for two people. It was empty aside from her though, which made her wonder, where was Shinji? While she wasn't exactly comfortable with the idea of him sleeping beside her, having him so _close_ , she also didn't want to kick him off his own bed.

Damn feelings for being complicated.

Sitting up she finally had a good look around of where exactly she was. It was an apartment bathed in soft morning light, filtering through the blinds and a large panoramic window. It had an open layout with no real dividing walls or clear rooms and big too, a bit less than twice the size of Misato's apartment back at Tokyo-3. It was well organized and clean, not surprising if this was Shinji's place like she guessed it was.

Shinji seemed to have divided it up into four main sections. First was the 'bedroom' where she was, in one of the corners with the large bed but little else, just various hampers for dirty laundry and a night stand with a lamp beside the bed. She also noticed there was also a pair of closets built into recessed into the wall, and the door to the bathroom was nearby, open just a tiny bit, as well as another door she wasn't sure the purpose of. Not too far away was something of a…work space she guessed. Near the corner was some kind of computer desk set up with what she recognized was a printer and…another machine that looked similar but she couldn't tell what it was. On a long table against the wall were a few weapons in various states of disassembly, while a beefy metal sliding door was not too far away.

Scattered throughout the apartment, mounted onto the walls, were glass display cases with lighting shining down from above. Some held guns and various pieces of gear while others were still empty.

On the other side of the apartment, near the entrance was the 'living room'. It had a _huge_ monitor on the wall, with a pair of dark leather couches. A small smile worked up on her face as she noticed several machines set up under the monitor, Asuka hoped they were was some futuristic consoles or something, if not she was for sure going to get some, she had a _lot_ of games to catch up on. In the corner of the space was a beautiful black grand piano with a cello stood up on the corner nearby. She wasn't too surprised on the latter but the piano did surprise her.

When did Shinji pick that skill up? _'Or maybe there wasn't space for one at Misato's place…'_

Wouldn't surprise her if that was the case, Shinji had never been one to talk about himself unless asked. Even _then_ she sometimes felt like having him talk about himself, especially in their early days together, it was like pulling teeth.

Another surprise was what was set up by the widow. It was a Christmas tree of all things, fully decorated with tinsel, ornaments, and lights that emitted a soft beautiful glow of blues, reds, greens and yellows. Topping the tree off was a star on top, while the bottom of the tree had a noticeable lack of presents.

Well at least she finally has an idea on what time of the year she was revived at.

The last corner of the apartment just _screamed_ 'Shinji lives here' to her though, so much so that she couldn't help but laugh when she saw it. It was a large, very clean, very well kitted out kitchen space with a sliding door leading to what seemed to be a balcony close by. The kitchen has a large fridge, separate freezer, stove, wall mounted oven and various other kitchen gadgets gleamed like polished silver in the light and…were those granite counter tops? Even the island, which had a few stools set up nearby so she assumed it also doubled as a dining table, had what looked like a granite top.

' _Well…Shinji's dream finally comes true, huh?'_ Still as happy as she was for him…where the hell was he?

"Ghost, you there?" she called out and her robotic companion flashed into the physical world in front of her.

"Good morning Guardian, I am always at your side."

"Yeah good morning," boy it still felt strange to talk to a robot, even more so that she was greeting the little drone. A bit of guilt hit her as she remembered she rarely did so to Shinji, and he was _human_ _'...one more thing to improve on.'_ Still, she shook it off for the moment. "Ghost where's Shinji?"

"Ah, Hunter Shinji went out to run an errand earlier. He was scarce with the details, but he did mention buying groceries."

"I see…" Asuka then looked down…and blushed as she realized two things. One: she was now dressed in a shirt and shorts that were _obviously_ for a male body. Two: She did _not_ remember dressing herself. Third: They smelled like Shinji…her blush deepened as she remembered how she knew that, the times she- _'OKAY! That stops there…'_ She took a moment, calmed her heart and waited for her face to cool before she spoke. "Okay Ghost, correct me if I'm wrong…Shinji carried me here."

"Correct."

"Right…d-did he…who changed me?"

"Mari did, his Ghost. Hunter Shinji was _very_ adamant that you were given privacy, he even took me outside to wait."

"…oh." She couldn't help but sigh in relief. Her…feelings for Shinji being as confusing to her as they are right now, having him change her was something she was _not_ ready for. Not in _any way_. "That's good…might as well get cleaned up and wait for him I guess."

After a quick trip into the bathroom to shower and freshen up, although sadly she had no panties or any other clothes to change into, she was now sitting at the island/table at the kitchen area of the apartment. The lights were now on and a nice warm cup of coffee was lovingly held in her hands as her Ghost hovered around nearby, humming a piece of classical music she vaguely recognized from somewhere to himself…or was it itself?

Asuka took an appreciative sip of her drink. "Mmmm…" she let out a small happy sigh, "it looks like my insistence that elite Eva pilots should only drink the best coffee stuck. I have to say this is some good stuff."

"Times like this I wish Ghosts could drink…" Asuka blinked and looked up to see her little drone staring at her cup…if she dare say it, with longing? The future was _weird._

Speaking of her Ghost… "hey Ghost there are a lot of Guardians, right? Not just me and Shinji."

"Hm? Correct, there are a few hundred registered active Guardians as-of-date."

"And all of them have Ghosts too."

"Correct, though most are like I am. Mari is…a unique case."

' _Thank Gott for that…'_ she'd put up with the annoying little pink drone for Shinji's sake but she would be tempted to shoot them if there was more than one Ghost as annoying as her. Asuka still remembered Mari laughing at her in the _Damsel's_ cargo bay. Speaking of unique ghosts though… "hey Ghost, I have another question. Do all Guardians call their Ghosts _just_ Ghost? Is Mari unique in that she goes around with a name?"

"Well most Ghosts don't have names of their own but a few Guardians name theirs, they are the minority however. As for Mari…well from what I've heard from other Ghosts she insisted she be referred as such, and wasn't named by Ikari-san. In that regard she is unique."

Asuka nodded and hummed to herself as she thought "…do you have anything you want to go by, Ghost?"

"Pardon, Guardian?"

"Well, I would personally find it confusing to have to say 'Ghost' and have someone a different Ghost float up to me. Besides," she grinned, "you're not just _any_ Ghost. You're now the Ghost of _the_ great Asuka Langley-Soryu!" Leaning forward she rested on her shoulders, lifting up her cup. "I don't do 'like everyone else', and I sure as hell won't have you run around with such a generic name. So, have anything in mind?"

"I'll be proud to be called whatever name you so choose, Asuka-san."

"Hmm," leaning back she took another sip "…how about… _Epsilon_?"

"I like it…does it have a meaning?"

"No, not really. I just think it sounds cool and techy," she shrugged. "If you want something touchy-feely and squishy then go to Shinji." Well that was assuming he hadn't changed too much. _'Really is weird just coming back to life thousands of years in the future, just doesn't feel like any time has passed since 2015. It's like I time traveled.'_

The door behind her clicked and she looked over her shoulder to see Shinji walk in, plastic bags in hand with the pink form of Mari floating right over his shoulder. He was obviously dressed in civilian clothes now, black jeans, grey boots and a red pullover sweater with the hood pulled over his head.

"You know, I approve of the red sweater. Happy to see that your wardrobe has improved."

Shinji closed the door with his foot, which automatically locked with a click, and was about to open his mouth-

"Oh man!" Mari chimed in and flew at Asuka, making the redhead flinch back, and stopped right in her face. "You have no _idea_ how hard it was to break him out of his old style, Princess. It took me exactly-"

"Mari," Shinji chimed in as he walked over to the kitchen, having taken off his boots and lowered his hood, "I don't think Asuka needs to know how much time you used to 'better' me, down to the last second."

"Hmph, humans, no appreciation for precision."

"Anyway," Shinji opened the fridge and started to put away the groceries and as he spoke Asuka couldn't help but be surprised at the normality of the present. She knew the world had changed, that he and she had changed but aside from the different setting, clothes and ages this wasn't all that different from what Shinji used to do when he bought groceries for the Katsuragi apartment. "Mari bugged me for about a year to change how I dressed when she noticed that all the clothes I bought were the same."

"And boring, don't forget _boring._ "

"… _Yes_ …that, thank you Mari-"

"Welcooome Puppy!"

Shinji sighed and shook his head silently and she had to admit she had to empathize with him, Mari drove her nuts the moment they met, Shinji had been stuck with her for longer and had the little drone living in his head. "Eventually I gave in."

"Well," Asuka took another sip of her coffee, "I'm glad you listened, especially if you dressed like how you used to with that damn white school uniform…that's all you wore when you first came back, wasn't it?"

"…I can neither confirm nor deny that." Asuka sighed, "I had things to do! I was very busy in those early months."

She couldn't help but snicker, a small smile worming its way to her face. She had missed this during their early days, a bit of bickering and arguing, their words holding no actual bite. "Oh boy. Well I'm glad you listened to someone else, you were surprisingly stubborn back then."

"…why is everyone picking on me this morning?" she heard him mumble before turning around to her, fridge still open. "You haven't had breakfast yet, right?" She shook her head in the negative and he smiled, a fire seemingly lit in his eyes. "Then I'll cook you something."

With that said he turned around and started to go through the fridge, muttering to himself all the while. Asuka had to admit the thought of a meal cooked by him sounded _wonderful_ after the whirlwind of yesterday. Just as she thought that an image of the past flashed in her mind, of seeing him watch her eat his meals and waiting for approval, waiting for words as _simple_ as a fucking 'good job' that never really came.

Deciding it was as good time as any to start changing herself she spoke up.

"I think that sounds great, Shinji…" she flushed a bit and swallowed, _everything was so much easier in her head_ , and waited for his response.

"Uh…t-tha…" he took a deep breath and she imagined him being as flustered as she was. "Um…I'll be making pfannkuchen…so uh," she couldn't help but blink at that, when did he cook German food? Not that she was complaining of course but it did surprise her, just like his perfect pronunciation. "I…uh, I'll try not to disappoint you, Asuka."

He didn't, he _really_ didn't. Hell it was one of the best fucking things she ever had and she made sure to tell him such.

He blushed like a tomato, it was _adorable._

That thought then made _her_ blush, that _wasn't_ so adorable.

All in all it was one of her best mornings ever.

* * *

"…and that goes over the basics of the three races that make up the Vanguard, The City and humanity as a whole," Asuka's Ghost, Epsilon, explained. "Baseline humans, such as yourself, the robotic Exo and the Awoken. Any questions?"

"Yeah I have a few…"

Shinji smiled as he tuned Asuka out. He was currently working away in the kitchen, carefully chopping up an onion on the island so it didn't sting his eyes.

Mari floated in front of him and was about to land on the granite counter like a huge pink metallic fly but he lazily swatted her away with half a chopped onion. "Hey! What was that for, Puppy?"

"No landing on top of the countertops once I've cleaned them for use, Mari. It's unsanitary-and yes, I can practically see you opening your mouth, I _am_ calling you dirty. You Ghosts don't like to bathe."

"We're sensitive to water! Do you want a lady to rust?"

"Your shell is made of a composite ceramic shell reinforced with polymer plastics and I know for sure your core can't rust," he listed off blandly. It was a common enough argument, he cleaned Mari often with things like wet sterile wipes but she refused to take a proper wet bath. _'I have a cat, no legs but she's basically a cat. An insane cat.'_

"Hmph…anyway, what's with the smile?"

He nodded his head to the side where Asuka sat on the couch of his 'living room', where her Ghost was currently going over some information. It was all what he had considered the essential basics and recommended Epsilon teach her now, instead of having her be surprised by everything like he was. It was simple things: different friendly races, basics about the different enemy factions and species', the workings of the economy, that kind of stuff. She was still dressed in his clothes, he assumed she'd like to choose her own so he didn't buy her anything, but she did at least have some underwear on since Mari had bought some when they went out.

He consciously made the decision to tell Mari to buy it all on her own without him. That was the last thing he needed. Guardians didn't age physically and he was stuck as a teen, which means he's constantly under attack by his hormones.

"Doesn't it make you a little nostalgic Mari? Doesn't it remind you of our first few days together?"

"Hahaha…yeah," she 'blinked' and glanced slightly up at the ceiling, reminiscing herself. She remembered those days well, she was so ecstatic back then. After hundreds of years of searching she had finally found her Guardian. "We had some... _issues_ but you were so adorable back then, you were so shy, even worse than now. Hey! Remember when you first met _Zavala_? HA! You _squeaked_ at him!"

"He's very big!" honestly he thought it was unfair of her to make fun of him. Zavala was _huge_ , a blue tower of muscle covered in silver armour. "And why do you always have to remember the embarrassing stuff?"

"Shinji?" he heard Asuka ask him.

"I'm fine! Mari's just being annoying again," he replied.

 _'Anyway it should've cooled off a bit…'_ he put down the onion and knife and washed his hand before going over to the kitchen counter. There, near the stove, was a plate of hand made takoyaki.

Takoyaki was a Japanese snack food, bite sized balls of batter filled with pieces of octopus and cooked golden brown. This batch was freshly made, his hot cast iron takoyaki pan still cooling down on his stove top, but he had decided to let it cool just a tad so it wouldn't burn anyone. Picking one up he popped one in his mouth… _'Mmmm, perfect.'_

Putting on the finishing touches he grabbed a bottle of brown takoyaki sauce and brushed the little morsels liberally. That done he grabbed some Japanese mayonnaise, which was more savory than normal mayonnaise and had a nice rich yellow colour instead of pale white, and poured some on in a criss-cross pattern for presentation. To top it all off he sprinkled some aonori flakes, dried seaweed. Normally it was also topped with katsuobushi, or bonito flakes _but_ …he grabbed a bag of it and handed it to Mari who flashed it away as well as the small container of toothpicks beside it.

He thought it would be fun to add that in front of Asuka. As someone who had also been revived from the dead he knew that the years between death and rebirth just weren't felt, how could they be? When Mari first woke him, standing on the corpse of Unit-01, his most recent memories had been of the attack on NERV, the JSSDF killing everyone, leaving bodies and destruction in their wake.

Asuka would be no different so he wanted to keep her happy, it was why he made a breakfast from her home country. His efforts to keep those bad memories away seemed to have worked to him and he would try to keep her that way.

Picking up the plate he made a quick count, slightly more than three dozen, should be enough for the both of them. If he made too much then…well, he wasn't going to complain about left overs, he'd gladly finish what's left.

"Hey Asuka," he walked to the fridge to grab a drink, "how about you take a break and have a snack?"

"Oh, uh sure."

"Is cola ok? It's all I have."

"Yeah that's fine," he closed the door and started to walk over to the couch where he could see the six legged form of a Fallen Walker, or 'spider tank' as some liked to call it, on his large wall mounted display.

"Those things are tough," he couldn't help but comment. "They're some of the last things you want to run into on a foot patrol."

She craned her neck to look over at him and he could see the surprise there which made sense, considering he had basically admitted to fighting a tank on foot. "You fought those things?"

"Oh yeah, they're the Fallen's heavy artillery. They actually had one at the Geofront, it's why we had you meet up with us so far away from where your Ghost revived you. That cannon packs a punch and I didn't want to risk the _Damsel_."

Going around the couch he placed the plate on the table in front of her and he could easily see her curiosity. "Is that…takoyaki?"

"Yup," he nodded as he took a seat right beside her and handed her a can of cold cola. "Have you had it before?"Asuka shook her head. "Well I hope you like it then…it's um, a favourite of mine." Mari floated over and flashed the toothpicks and bag of katsuobushi onto the table. Opening it he sprinkled on the thin brown flakes and as they landed on the warm takoyaki they danced, like magic, like they were alive. A small smile grew on his face the sight, glancing at Asuka he saw that there was a small amused smile on her face too. It wasn't an amazed gasp, or a smile of wonder but it was a smile, and that was enough for him. "Go ahead."

* * *

Leaning back into the sofa Asuka let out a satisfied sigh. Shinji and her had just divided up the takoyaki so they each had half, which apparently surprised him if his face was any indication. What can she say though? Yesterday took a lot out of her, thinking Shinji had died, running for her life, fighting, _more_ running for her life, and then their emotional reunion. Some comfort food hit the spot _just right._

The fact that Mari had stared at the two of them munching away with what Asuka suspected was envy, or it did seem that way in her head anyway, made it _that much better._

"Hey Shinji," she craned her head over the back of the sofa, to see Shinji walking away with a dirty plate, two empty cans piled on top.

"Hm?" he hummed as he walked into the kitchen and out of her sight.

"Are you sure this is all really ok?"

"…is what ok?"

" _This_ , just sitting here and relaxing, eating snacks and having Epsilon lecture me. I mean don't we have…I dunoe, _things to do_ , asses to kick?" she couldn't help but ask before quickly adding on, "not that I'm complaining."

"Well…" his voiced echoed out as she heard the sink turn on, "we _could_ just have jumped straight into being a Guardian but…" His voice trailed off and when it returned it sounded distinctly embarrassed, "let's just say I did that and ended up kind of…uh…e-embarrassing myself."

"…Ok I have to ask, what happened?"

"C-Can we not talk about it?"

" _Fine_ ," she made a mental note to bug him later anyway, it sounded like there was a fun story behind it all. Maybe Mari would spill something?

"You know you're taking this a lot better than I thought you would Asuka-n-not that I didn't think you'd take it well!"

She frowned at his stuttering, she knew _why_ he seemed so nervous with that last statement and she would be lying if she said she didn't feel a small spike of anger at his seeming doubt of her strength but…it was a tired anger. What if this was their last day together? The world was dangerous, now more than ever. If her last words to him…if her last words to him _hurt_ him…she didn't want to think about it.

After a while she spoke up, hoping she hadn't blanked out for too long. "What do you mean?"

"Well…when I was first brought back I was…a-a bit of a mess…" he cleared his throat, "anyway let's just say the present…shocked me back then. Aliens, living robots, technology I've never thought of, space magic…it was a lot to take in all at once you know?" There was a pause that let her drink in what he had said, and honestly it made her feel lucky that she had not been brought back alone. She cringed as she realized something. Shinji had always been a meek kid, shy and quiet. He would've been worse off than her. "So yeah…"

"Hmm…I see. No offense taken Shinji…" she licked her lips, what else more could she say? She didn't have experience making people feel better, no real expirience comforting someone. Eventually she decided to just go forward and Asuka took a deep breath, "don't sweat it. I get what you mean…ok?"

"Yeah…

"Um anyway, I think it all hasn't sunk in yet."

"What do you mean?"

"Well it was…all so sudden you know?" she waved her hand in front of her face. "I got brought back, thought you were dead and BAM! Straight into it all and now I'm busy trying to get everything Epsilon's saying and thinking about the immediate future, getting ready for this Guardian thing. That last bit should take long though, I am _me._ " She couldn't help but chuckle, "check back in a few days though Shinji…Hm, speaking of which, what about you?"

"Uhhh," came the response, "what about me?"

' _Ah Shinji, always so eloquent,'_ she couldn't help but me amused. "I meant don't you have Guardian stuff to do today, Dummkopf."

"...what happened to Baka?"

"Well since you seem to understand German now I thought I might call you something German. I'm still testing how it sounds though."

" _Ok_...Well I've talked to the Vanguard, made my report and stuff but…well they didn't really mind if I took a day off. I uh, have a bit of a workaholic reputation. I think they're happy I'm resting, and helping a new Guardian get settled is a good reason to take a day off, right? OH! Um, are you up to go out later?"

"When?"

"Um…an hour or two from now?"

"Sure," she shrugged as she heard Shinji shut off the faucet and walk over so she turned to him, raising a brow in curiosity. "What are we doing?"

"Well we need to get you a place to stay."

She froze, _no. No, no, no, no, no._ Images flashed in her mind of a scared and lonely little girl, sleeping alone, crying herself to sleep.

"Asuka?"

Memories surfaced of nightmares, of flashes of pain and suffering, of running down the halls high on her appointment as a pilot…only to find the body of her Mama. No, she didn't want to go back to those lonely days, after Misato left Germany and before Kaji was her guardian, when her life was at its loneliest, at its darkest, where those that looked after her never cared.

"Asuka!" she jerked and blink to find Shinji kneeling in front of her, his hands on her shoulders, a frown of worry on his lips and concern in his eyes. _Concern for her._ "Are you alright? Y-You just…froze. We don't have to go out today if you're not feeling well."

She shook her head in the negative and looked down, hiding her eyes from his.

"I…I…" she whispered, almost too soft to hear. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, calming herself down, feeling pathetic for her borderline breakdown. Finding her centre she schooled her features and looked up, her fiery blue eyes locking onto his steel blue. She _needed_ to know why he asked that. "I'm fine Shinji. I just…d-don't you…" her faced heated despite the situation, "don't you want to live together? L-Like the old days?"

Something flashed in his eyes she didn't recognize and he looked away from her, licking his lips. "I…I do…Asuka I do but…I know you don't want to." He said, sounding so _certain_. There were tears in his eyes now and Asuka had never seen him look so…so _vulnerable,_ so _fragile_. "You always complained about living together, remember? About how you never had privacy or space…It's okay...I'm used to being alone now."

Asuka swallowed, her throat dry like the desert, guilt punching her in the gut as she saw how much he had taken her words to heart. Seeing him so…so…so _sure_ of it and all and so resigned, accepting what she knew he didn't want just so she could be happy…

It was _heart breaking._

Her body moved before she could think, wrapping her arms around him in a gentle embrace, her tears falling once more.

"A-Asuka?!" she heard him shout out. "W-What's wrong?"

"Shut up Baka…" she embraced him tighter, "how can you just _say that_? How can you just accept being alone?"

"I'm use-"

"Shut up! God damnit…that's not right…that's not right." She nuzzled into his soft brown hair "…I'm _staying_ Shinji."

"Bu-"

" _Gott verdammt_ just shut up! I'm staying and that's final…" she chuckled, the sound coming out with a sob. "It's obvious someone has to look out for a dummkopf like you."

"Asuka…" he breathed out and wrapped his arms around her waist, his tears soaking her shirt. "Thank you... _thank you_...thank you so much" he embraced her tighter, like he was afraid that if he let go she would disappear like a cruel dream. "I...I missed you so much Asuka." _  
_

"Shh...I'm right here," she ran a hand through his hair to try and calm him down, pulling out every ounce of compassion she had as she whispered reassurances at him. It was hard for her to be gentle, having spend most of her life trying to be strong, being angry...but as he seemingly broke down from years of who knows what...Asuka knew she had to try.

She stayed like that for several minutes, the young man she saw tear through Fallen like a super hero just the day before sobbing into her chest.

* * *

As Asuka pulled over another of Shinji's indoor shirts, ignoring who it smelt like, her mind wandered back to his breakdown. It was totally different to what he had seemed to have grown into. Everything from his shooting and fighting skill, his mastery over his powers of Light, and his shy but happy behaviour gave her the impression that Shinji had become a confident and content but shy young warrior. She hadn't really picked up on anything that gave her any indication he had issues until...his breakdown today.

She sighed, then again she really shouldn't assume she had him all figured out. According to Mari he had been a Guardian for several years now. What had those years been like? How had he lived before her arrival? He lived alone, or at least he had been living alone recently. The apartment's layout and organization was vert...well Shinji. She hadn't seen any signs of anyone else living with him and from the comment that he 'lone wolfed' earlier today then she was reasonably confident that was the case. Other than that she had almost nothing. He was 'a mess' he said in his early days but for how long was he 'a mess'? What did that mean?

Simply put she didn't know enough. It also didn't help that she had no clue what happened to him between her last clear memory of him, Shinji sitting in his Eva during her last Angel battle, and his death.

So many questions...Asuka shook her head violently, her fiery mane flying as she cleared her head. Brooding and worrying had to wait. After he calmed down Shinji had said that she could go and get her Guardian career started tomorrow, if she was ready.

Of course she was ready! So she had to make sure she was in good shape and focused for tomorrow. After she was settled...then she'd try to find answers.

As she walked out of the bathroom she had to admit she felt surprisingly…lighter after her and Shinji's second tearfest in just as many days, her concerns for him aside. Who knew crying could feel so good?

…She didn't plan to do it all the time though, she was still Asuka and opening up still…didn't feel _quite_ right but considering the circumstances...she was fine with it.

She glanced at the kitchen where Shinji was washing his hand, getting ready to get an early start on their dinner. His face had a small smile but it was the brightest she'd ever seen on him, it was so…not quite carefree but the closest thing to it the redhead had seen on her fellow former pilot. Seeing that smile…well, as weird as it felt, it was worth it.

Mari floated over to her.

Thus ending her stellar mood.

"Hey Princess," an eye twitched at that.

'Remember Asuka _, Shinji obviously loves the pink demon. Shooting her with your shotgun would upset him.'_ Gott she hated that _damn_ nickname. "What is it?" she asked, trying hard not to grit her teeth.

"If you're sticking around with Puppy-kun does that mean we're forming a fireteam?"

"…a what now?"

"Oh," it was Shinji who chimed in, "um I can answer that. Guardians, when working in groups, form fireteams of up to three Guardians. Sometimes fireteams are temporary, formed for a particular mission or operation, and sometimes they're permanently formed by Guardians who like to work together. The permanent teams of less than three can take on a temporary member if their numbers are lacking."

"I see…don't you have one though Shinji?"

"Um-"

"Ha!" Mari cut him off, "you know how shy he is right? I mean-"

"Hey!"

"He'll join up for an op but that's it," the 'wings' of her shell made a shuffle up and down, like a weird and annoyingly adorable shrug. "So how about it?"

Asuka grinned, "I'm game, you're game right Shinji?"

He blushed, "o-of course."

"Good," Asuka nodded, relieved that they didn't break out in tears again. Walking over to the counter she took a seat as Epsilon flashed into the world, floating over to the living room, probably to prepare a new lecture. Mari went off after him, nagging her poor Ghost. "…finally, the Pinkie is gone."

Shinji chuckled, "sorry about Mari. She means well, I think she likes you though."

Asuka rolled her eyes as she turned to him, her words dripping with sarcasm. " _Wow_ , I am so _grateful._ "

He smiled, obviously not offended. "She _does_ tend to annoy people, I know. I try to keep her on a leash but…well, she's like a cat, not reasonable like Pen-Pen, and not very fond of listening to people."

"…She's your Ghost though, Epsilon listens to everything I say."

"She's unique. By the way are you sure you want to stay here-not that I want you to leave!" he quickly reassured her. "I mean that…do you want to get a different apartment? I mean I liked not having walls since it made walking around easier but there's not a lot of privacy."

"Yeah, I've heard about her uniqueness," she couldn't help but mutter. Taking a moment she thought about the no walls issue. For changing she and Shinji could just use the bathroom like she had, and _boy_ did she feel warm and funny at the thought of seeing Shinji change, so that was no issue. Giving him credit she had to agree it was sort of nice to not worry about walking around walls, and if anything it did give the place a nice open feel.

Then memories flashed again, of all the times she had locked herself in her room to brew in her angst, in her frustration, in her _anger_ , as she shut the world away. How many problems could've been solved or avoided, how happy would she had been if instead of hiding like _coward_ she just…talked to him?

No, she liked the open floor plan better.

"It's fine. I don't mind and I like how open it feels, besides you're already all moved in." Okay, she was too proud and embarrassed to admit the truth, sue her. _'One step at a time Asuka.'_ She glanced down at what he was doing, seeing him peeling some carrots. "Making something fancy for dinner? I can't remember you ever starting dinner this early before."

He raised a brow at her, she had no clue why, but seemed to shrug whatever it was off. "Well I thought we'd celebrate tonight so I'm making a bit of a feast."

She was about to open her mouth to ask _why_ they would be celebrating before she froze, her face warming as blood rushed. What else would he be celebrating about other than her revival? It was obvious enough he missed her from his earlier words…her face went from pink to red. Luckily Shinji was too busy to notice so she had time to take a few minutes to calm herself down.

After a few minutes of awkward, for Asuka (she _doubted_ Shinji felt the same considering how he tended to get into his little zone when cooking), she coughed and spoke up. "S-So…what are you making…um, will you take a request?"

He shrugged, still obviously concentrating, his voice obviously distracted. "Sure. I had a plan but I haven't really done anything but some really basic prep."

She thought back of the happier days at the Katsuragi apartment dinner table, Shinji, Misato and herself eating together. Shinji made almost nothing but Japanese meals back then and she had always complained at the lack of variety but…she couldn't lie to herself. He had never made anything bad, even on his worse days he put care into everything he made.

Before she knew it his cooking, Japanese cooking, had become something she had come to love. Her mind flashed back to the month he spent trapped in Unit-01, and how she had sometimes snuck off after school to buy Japanese take-out. It wasn't the same but…if she closed her eyes it let her remember what his cooking was like.

"C-Can we have…Japanese?"

He looked up at her and she looked up and away, she couldn't help but find the ceiling interesting. It was so clean.

She heard him chuckle, "if that's what you want…Princess."

Asuka froze and her face lit on fire, _'w-when did Shinji get so…so cheeky?!'_

It was official, Mari was a _terrible_ influence on her Baka.

That meal was great though, Pinkie's envy just made it all the better.

 **Chapter 4: Christmas Adventure (WELCOME TO THE VANGUARD)**

 **AN**

Well again, sorry this is so late. Anyway not much to say I guess since I've apologized already.

Um not much to this chapter plot wise I think, no big battle, just a lot of WAFF and some bonding between the two. Honestly this chapter wasn't meant to be so dramatic at first, it was initially all light fluff, some slice of life stuff but…well it didn't feel right so I hope you guys liked it.

The series had a always been intended to be a bit lighter than Eva tends to be. I mean Destiny is big on hope. The end of what was canon NGE played out differently in this timeline. Shinji actually does come to fight the MP Evas and Third Impact never happens, allowing humanity to find the Traveller in the future and eventually enter its Golden Age. Yes Shinji was still too late and he ultimately died but they both come back to life in the end. The story was always meant to be a more light adventure, focusing on sweet moments and action.

On the other hand it just didn't feel right for what happened in the scene to not happen, that he wouldn't break down so badly after not seeing her for YEARS and he had spent all that time genuinely convinced that what she had said to him had been true, that for her to be happy he had to be alone.

To those wondering why Asuka took everything in stride, or seems to be, it's just like she said. I always felt that Asuka is very much a 'doer' type person, she's kind of single minded sometimes. She finds a target and she locks on it, and right now she's concentrating on getting up to speed, adjusting to her new life and reality and not being a burden on Shinji or causing him trouble.

Next chapter we meet the cast at the Tower and Asuka starts her first proper day as a Titan-class Guardian of the Vanguard!


End file.
